


A December Love Story

by Melime



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Stargate, Alternate Universe - Romantic Comedy, Christmas, Falling In Love, Family Issues, First Dates, First Kiss, First Meetings, First Time, Getting Together, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, New Year's Eve, New Year's Kiss, Relationship Issues, Tumblr: otpprompts, WIP Big Bang, WIP Big Bang 2016
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-18
Updated: 2016-07-18
Packaged: 2018-07-24 18:41:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7519094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/pseuds/Melime
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Sheppard, black sheep of a billionaire family, just wants to find a stable job and give reconciliation with his family a final chance. Rodney McKay, researcher, is trying to reconnect with his sister and get to know his niece. A chance encounter at a toy store leads to John inviting Rodney for the Sheppard Global Christmas party, where a somewhat expected confrontation with his homophobic father costs him his job. John and Rodney have an almost instantaneous connection, and while their growing relationship is complicated by John's precarious financial situation and Rodney's past issues with relationships, they are both determinate to make things work.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A December Love Story

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Português brasileiro available: [Uma História de Amor em Dezembro](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7595758) by [Melime GreenLeaf (Melime)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/pseuds/Melime%20GreenLeaf)



> I started this last November, when I was doing promptember. The first scene was inspired by this prompt from the [OTP prompts tumblr](http://otpprompts.tumblr.com/):
> 
> "[Person A is trying to find a very popular toy for a niece/nephew, and manages to find the last one in a store. Person B, in the same situation, finds the toy at the exact same time. Person A agrees to let Person B have the toy - in exchange for something else (a date to the office holiday party, a coffee later, etc.). Does Person B accept, and if so, what happens next?](http://otpprompts.tumblr.com/post/88528084525/person-a-is-trying-to-find-a-very-popular-toy-for)"
> 
> It kinda grew on its own, and before I knew it, it was a Christmas story. The only problem is that December passed before I managed to finish it, so I lost a bit of my eagerness to finish it. Thankfully, the WIP Big Bang came along and gave me a deadline, which helped me more than I was expecting. I really liked the result and I hope you guys like it too. Many thanks to my lovely beta [feygrim](http://archiveofourown.org/users/feygrim), as always, any mistakes left are entirely mine.
> 
> Oh, and in my defense, I want to say that all my knowledge of MLP comes from having a 4yo sister, and since I don't know what kind of toys are popular, I just used one I knew she would love, and gave Madison her favorite character (at the time I started writing). If I had started a little later perhaps I would have used BB-8.

Tuesday, December 1st

 

Rodney cursed Christmas and everything it represented. Surely someone with a genius level IQ shouldn’t be forced to be roaming stores near closing time looking for a--he looked at the text again--Equestria Girls Pinkie Pie doll (singing edition), whatever the hell that was. Jeannie acted as if he should be grateful for the tip she gave him, taken from Madison’s Santa Claus letter, but he found the whole situation ridiculous. Who would even believe in something as impossible as Santa Claus at the age of, what was she again? Three? Four? The point was, parents shouldn’t be teaching their children about old men invading their houses in the middle of the night and being able to read thoughts, that was just wrong. And that wasn’t even touching the fact he had to leave the lab early in other to look for said doll. He could be saving the world, and instead he was holding a photo on his phone next to what seemed like thousands of identical dolls, trying to find the right one. After this, he at least hoped Christmas would involve real food.

It was the third store he checked without success, and it was almost closing time. He was about to give up, and maybe try the internet again, but figured he should at least finish with this corridor after coming so far. When he turned the corner, he immediately saw a large stand in the middle of the corridor, featuring a drawing of that strange girl who was apparently also a pony in a way that Madison had explained over the phone, but Rodney didn’t care enough about to pay attention. He could see a single box of the pink girl still there, and not believing his luck, he nearly ran towards it. He had just wrapped his fingers around the box and was pulling it, when somebody else pulled it too. He raised his eyes to find out who would dare to try to take his prize from him, and was stunned for a moment.

No one had the right to look this good while making last minute desperate Christmas shopping. Strike that, no one had the right to look this good, period. He had gorgeous hazel eyes that seemed to change to grey when he turned his head to look at Rodney, his hair was a mess but it somehow seemed to compliment his features, and he was dressed in business casual attire.

Rodney was furious. He knew he was a mess after spending the whole day in the lab, and he resented that stranger for daring to look good. There was no way he would let him get that doll. Rodney pulled, and the stranger pulled back.

“This is mine, I saw it first,” Rodney said.

“No, I saw it first, you just came running in the corridor.”

Rodney rolled his eyes. “Fine, but I got it first. It’s not my fault you are slow.”

“I’m not letting go.”

“Then we are staying here, because I’m not letting go either. I need this doll.”

“You are not one of those guy who want to fuck ponies are you?”

Rodney made a disgusted face, and almost let go of the box. “What the hell? Why you would even ask that? Why would anyone–? No, forget it, I don’t want to know. I need it for my niece.”

“Well, I need it for my niece.”

“I need it more.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Really? And why is that?”

Rodney averted his eyes, embarrassed. He wasn’t about to tell his entire life story to a stranger at a toy store. “It’s none of your business.”

“If you want to use it as an argument, then it kinda is.”

Or maybe he was, but only because he was really desperate. “Fine, because I missed all her previous Christmas, and birthdays. I just met her a couple months ago, I have no idea what she likes, and my sister just gave me the name of this toy and said I had to buy it, so I need it.”

The other man seemed to consider that for a moment. “That does sound like a good reason. How about this, I let you have the doll if you do me a little favor.”

Rodney squinted his eyes. “What favor?”

“I have a company Christmas party to go this Friday, but I don’t have a date. So, if you agree to go with me, I let go of the box.”

Rodney almost looked around searching for cameras, because there was no way this was happening in real life. People simply don’t get asked out by attractive strangers in exchange for the priority rights to buying a toy, especially not people that looked like they’ve slept on their desk the previous night. Which he didn’t. Sleep in his desk, that is. He moved to the couch in his lab sometime during the night, so it didn’t count. Still, he understood what was like not having a date for a party with his peers, and although he hadn’t went as far as hiring an escort, on occasion he had bribed a couple subordinates with the opportunity of using his resources to test their own theories, and that was close enough.

“Are you serious?” he said, squinting his eyes again.

The stranger had the decency of looking embarrassed. “Sorry if I overstepped my boundaries. My brother works there too, it’s the family business and I just started there yesterday. I just don’t want to give him the satisfaction of me going alone. Plus, my father will be there, and he always trying to marry me with his friends’ daughters.”

That seemed like a reasonable enough explanation, except for the ‘picking someone up at a toy store’, but stranger things had happened to Rodney. “Fine, I’ll go to the party if you let me have the doll.” He had meant to add some condition to it, just so it wouldn’t seem as if he was giving up too easily, but couldn’t think of anything that wasn’t ridiculous.

The man let go of the box with a smirk, and picked up a pen and a calling card from his jacket pocket. “Great. It’s this Friday at seven, call me if you want a ride there,” he said while writing something, then handed the card to Rodney.

Rodney took the card, noticing it once held a name he couldn’t read, but probably started with a D. The name had been stricken over several times, and ‘John’ was written on top of it, but the last name ‘Sheppard’ remained intact. The phone number was also written by hand, a cellphone number as well as a landline, printed, with just the extension corrected. Rodney raised an eyebrow. “Is this your business card?”

John rubbed the back of his neck. “As I said, I just came to work yesterday, my father finally convinced me to give the family business a chance. My cards weren’t printed yet, so I stole a couple from my brother.”

“And you always give out your work number to people you ask out, even if under these circumstances?”

“Well, I haven’t had a work number or a date in a little while, so maybe I’m a bit rusty. Just call me on my cellphone then.”

Rodney once again considered the situation, but then he figured his own social skills were even worse than John’s seemed to be, and that the poor guy would probably find that out in the worse possible way after Rodney failed to interact with his colleagues, so maybe this wasn’t so bad. He was never known for turning down beautiful people, in any case. “Then I guess I’ll see you Friday.”

“Until Friday.”

They went their separate ways, John keep looking for a toy, while Rodney went to the register. It was only when Rodney sat in the car that he realized John didn’t even know his name, nor had he any way of contacting Rodney. Hesitating only for a moment, he picked up his phone and dialed John’s number.

“John Sheppard,” the voice on the other end answered, tense and businesslike in a way that made Rodney uneasy.

“Hey, it’s, uh, me. We just met at the toy store.”

“Oh,” he said, clearly relaxing. “Did you just realize you had the wrong pony or something? I got the purple one for my niece.”

Rodney rolled his eyes. “No, this is it, Madison’s favorite, if I am to trust Jeannie,” he paused, and then noticed that John wouldn’t know who they were, so he added, “I mean, Madison is my niece, and Jeannie is my sister.” This wasn’t going how he planned, so he decided to go right to the point. “You didn’t get my name or my number, how do you expect to make me hold my end of the bargain?”

“I’m sorry to break it to you, but I have your number now, this is the way cellphones work. Seriously though, I was thinking it was more of a gentlemen’s agreement, I’m not going to force you to make me company.”

“You are lucky that I’m a man of my word. And you know, if you want to show me as your date to your family, maybe it would be better if we actually knew something about one another. How about we get some coffee tomorrow?” It was only after he said it that Rodney realized this could be seen as asking John out, and he wasn’t sure where that fell on the etiquette of fake dates. Because he was sure this was what it was, no more than fake date.

“Name the time and the place, I’ll be there.” He ended the sentence in an odd tone, having wanted to call Rodney, but not knowing his name, and failing to recover from the slip in time.

Rodney noticed that. “I’m Rodney, by the way. Rodney McKay. Doctor, if you plan on introducing me to anyone.”

John laughed. “Doctor, how impressive. PhD or MD?”

Rodney ruffed. “Please, medicine isn’t even a science. Astrophysics and Mechanical Engineering. I’ll text you the details about that coffee.”

“Great, then I guess I’ll see you tomorrow. Goodnight, Rodney.”

“Goodnight, John.”

Rodney hesitated for a moment, and John ended up being the first to hang up. He had no idea what was going on, and if he were to be honest with himself, probably wouldn’t have acted so impulsively if he had a proper amount of sleep the previous night, but as it were, he was curious to learn more about this John Sheppard.

He had parked in his own garage by the time the penny dropped. John Sheppard. The family business. The Sheppard family. He picked up the card to confirm and there it was, the logo of Sheppard Global. He had apparently just been fake asked out by the black sheep of a billionaire family. That raised more questions than it answered, and not for the first time, he wondered what exactly he had gotten himself involved in.

\---

 

Wednesday, December 2nd

 

“Hey, I got the doll. Had to pimp myself out to a billionaire to get it, but it’s here,” he said, without waiting for an answer on the other end of the line.

“This is Kaleb.”

Ok, maybe he should have waited. “Can you put my sister on, please?”

The line was silent for nearly a minute. “What’s this about you having to act all Pretty Woman to get the doll? What did you do?” Jeannie asked, sounding worried.

“That’s not what I… fine, that’s pretty much what I said. I just had to agree on playing escort to a John Sheppard, and yes, he’s one of the Sheppard’s, apparently.”

“How did you–? That doesn’t even make sense, you were only supposed to buy a doll, how did you get yourself into this mess?”

“I wish I knew, but he’s hot and I promised him, so I’m going to a Christmas party this Friday. At Sheppard Global.” Now he was just bragging, but Jeannie had been insisting he should date more.

“When we get there, you better explain this. And I hope you bought a tree.”

Shit, he forgot the tree. “Of course I bought a tree. What Christmas would be complete without a tree? Even though a tree has nothing to do with Christianism and I’m not even Christian in the first place. Or rather, we aren’t even Christian. It’s not as if I have anything better to do with my time, like completing research that is going to change the world,” he said, while writing on the back of his hand, ‘buy stupid Christmas tree’.

“We talked about it, it’s important for Madison. And you’ll see, the way her face lights up when she sees the tree filled with presents will make it all worth it.”

“Right. I have to go now. I have to meet someone for coffee.”

“The Sheppard guy?”

“No, one of my several secret boyf… guys. That I go on secret dates with. And can never meet each other or even know of each other’s existence. Don’t blow my cover.” He knew he ruined that comeback, but Jeannie mercifully didn’t comment on his hesitance over the word ‘boyfriend’. As sad as it were to see things got to this point, he knew they simply weren’t at a place they could talk about this kind of thing yet.

“Fine, your secret is safe with me. Good luck on your date.”

“Not a date. Just coffee.”

“If you say so.”

He hung up without another word. He had just called to assure her that Madison’s Christmas present was secure, not to have her judge him like that. He was about to leave when he had another idea, and picked up his phone again.

“First of all, this conversation never happened. If you tell anyone about it, you are fired.”

“Rodney, did you forget to drink your coffee?”

“No, I didn’t forget, but I’m going out for coffee today. But I could use… your advice on something. And don’t you dare laugh, Radek.” He almost regretted that decision, but after spending the night thinking about what had happened, he could use some advice from someone who, as much as he hated to admit it, was better at the whole dating thing than he was.

“Dr. Rodney McKay asking for my advice? Should I be worried?”

“Don’t be an ass. I need you because you are a slut.” He could almost see Radek rubbing his eyes.

“Remember what I told you? I have a boyfriend now, we can’t have sex anymore.”

Rodney rolled his eyes. “I said advice, not sex. What’s the etiquette on fake dates?”

“What?”

“If someone asks you to be his fake date, can you ask him out for real?”

There was a pause, then something in Czech that Rodney didn’t need to understand to know it was a curse. “Rodney, drink your coffee, tell the guy you give great head, and never call me asking something like this again.” Radek hanged up.

That was about as helpful as hitting his head on a wall. He figured there was only one way to find out if he had any chance with John, and that was to go out for coffee with him.

\---

John didn’t show up, and Rodney was starting to panic. He tried to convince himself that it wasn’t important, that he didn’t care, and that maybe John wasn’t even that good looking. He was spiraling in rationalizations when John arrived, fifteen minutes late.

“Sorry for the delay. Dave called me to complain about my work performance, and he wouldn’t shut up. I don’t know how he could talk so much if I’ve just been working for two days, but that’s Dave for you,” John said while sitting down. “He’s my brother,” he added, seeing Rodney’s confusion. “I hope you didn’t wait for me too long.”

“No, I wasn’t waiting, actually. I already had two espressos.”

John laughed. “I’m glad you didn’t let me stand between you and your coffee.”

“Sorry, I would have waited, but you really don’t want to see me before my first dose of caffeine.”

“I’m sure you can’t be that bad,” John said, with a charming smile.

Rodney didn’t blush, but it was a close call. “My lab assistants would disagree.” He took a sip of his third espresso.

John pointed at his hand. “Christmas shopping?”

Rodney looked absently at it. “Oh, yeah, my sister asked me to buy a Christmas tree. Well, actually, she thinks I bought one already, so now I have to go find one before she finds out. It’s part of her plan to make me a better brother, uncle, and overall a better human being, I assume.”

“Order it online, there’s still time for it to be delivered before Christmas, and this way you can avoid running into strangers that will ask out in exchange for letting you continue with your shopping.”

Rodney laughed. “But running into strangers worked so well for me last time.”

John smiled. “I’m glad to know you think so. Well, what did you want to know about me?”

“Anything more than I do now would be useful. You said you just started working at Sheppard Global, what did you do before?”

John’s face went dark for a moment. “I kept changing job and was unemployed for a while, before I was convinced to swallow my pride and accept my father’s offer. Before that, I was in the air force. My father may comment about this, so I may as well tell you. I was dishonorably discharged for having an issue deciding between following orders and doing what’s right, and that’s all I’m going to say about this.”

Rodney didn’t have anything good to say about the military, not after some terrible work experiences, so he diverted the subject. “I have my own lab. Well, technically it’s owned by a private company, and it’s only one of twenty inside the Higginson & Ingram complex, but I have complete autonomy. I have something like a hundred people under me, but I don’t micromanage so I can’t be sure. I figured since I know where you work you should know it too.”

“So I can tell my father you are quite a catch, huh? Somehow I still don’t think he’ll like you.”

“Do you want me to be likeable or unnerving? Despite what my employees may think, I can do likeable when the situation asks for it. I was always good at getting grants when I still needed those.”

“Honestly? Just show up and be yourself, I’m sure my father will hate me for being with you regardless.”

After John’s commentary about his father wanting to marry him with one of his friends’ daughters, he didn’t need to ask why he wouldn’t like him. “And you want him angry.”

John shrugged. “I don’t want to be anywhere near him. Sheppard Global has a development line for military aircrafts; I’m hoping that if I irritate him enough, he’ll want me far away and give me the demotion I want.”

“Most people don’t try to manipulate their bosses into giving them worse jobs.”

“You said you run a lab, but you don’t even know how many people work for you, right? How do you think you would like it if you had to give up research to stay strictly in administrative duty?”

Rodney thought about this for a moment. “Fine, I guess I can understand your reasons. That’s still a terrible plan, but I wouldn’t stand to work a day in an office, so I can sympathize.”

“Anything else you want to know?”

“There’s probably a lot more I should know, but I should get to work. I don’t usually get in this late, and if I’m not there, nobody works.”

“I’m sorry you have you leave so soon,” John said. “One last thing, do you want a ride on Friday?”

“Yes, I’ll text you my address. See you Friday for our fake date.”

John seemed disappointed, and hesitated for a moment, then gave up on whatever he wanted to say. “See you Friday.”

\---

“Your math is wrong,” Radek said, pointing at the place where Rodney apparently misread his own handwriting and assumed a seven was an one.

“I knew that. Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“Someone is angry. Problems with your fake date?”

Rodney looked around to make sure no one heard that. “Well, something odd happened this morning. We met for coffee, so we could know the basics about each other, and he showed up late. But after that we talked, and it was great, until he offered me a ride to the party, and I said yes. Then he acted as if I did something wrong and went away, I think I missed my chance.”

Radek sighed, the last thing he needed was dealing with Rodney’s drama, but as much as he hated to admit that, they were friends, and he knew Rodney didn’t have many of those. “Tell me what you two said, exactly. Starting from him offering you a ride.”

Rodney did just that. “It makes no sense, was I supposed to refuse?”

“Rodney, I almost dread asking this, but how do you know it’s a fake date?”

“What do you mean? Of course it’s a fake date, he asked me because he didn’t have anyone to take to a work party, and we were in a toy store.”

“But did he actually tell you it was a fake date?”

Rodney thought about it for a moment, then the penny dropped. “You think he asked me on a real date and was disappointed that I didn’t take it seriously?”

Radek patted his shoulder. “It would appear so.” He turned to leave.

“Wait! What do I do now?”

“Call him, tell him you are an idiot,” he shouted from the door, without turning back.

Of course Rodney wouldn’t do that. Or at least, not saying those exact words. He looked at his computer, it was a little after five, not too late to call.

“John Sheppard,” he answered, again in that serious and businesslike voice Rodney found so strange.

“Hey, it’s me, Rodney.”

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t look at caller id. I’m in a bit of a hurry.”

“If you busy, I can call you later.”

“I have a few minutes, if you don’t mind me talking on my way to the car.”

“As long as you don’t talk while driving, that’s dangerous.”

“I’m using a driver today, official work business, two things that I hate. What did you want to talk about?”

Rodney hesitated. “It was brought to my attention that maybe I misunderstood the nature of our date Friday.”

“Oh.” John paused, and Rodney could hear that he had stopped walking. “That’s ok, I understand. You don’t need to come if you don’t want to. And if you want to come just as a fake date, that’s alright too,” John said, and he almost managed to hide his disappointment.

There it was, the confirmation he was looking for. “Actually, I was thinking something more along the lines of, do you want to go to dinner tonight? A real date, just so we are clear.”

John hesitated. “I can’t.”

Rodney felt his heart drop, and didn’t wait for John to say anything else, quickly backpedaling. “Oh, okay, I’ll see you Friday then.”

“No, wait. What I mean is, I have to go with Dave pick up some representatives of a Chinese company that is our partner in some random endeavor. I haven’t read the briefing yet. Anyway, I need to take them to dinner. But I’m free tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow then. I picked the café, so you can pick the restaurant.”

“Great, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“See you tomorrow.”

Rodney could hardly believe it. Somehow, under the strangest circumstances, he had managed to land what was his first proper date in years.

\---

 

Thursday, December 3rd

 

Rodney wasn’t nervous, and if one more person said that it looked like he was, they would be out of a job. And maybe he left work a little early to get ready, but that didn’t mean anything. He just knew how he could get absorbed in whatever he was working and lose track of time.

John chose a nice cozy restaurant, and arrived five minutes early just to be sure. It was apparent that neither one of them was confident enough at this to deal with minor misunderstandings, so he wanted to be careful.

At first, things were awkward, with long silences cut by both of them trying to talk at once, but as soon as they landed on the topic of sci-fi, they realized how much they had in common and things flowed well from there.

\---

 

Friday, December 4th

 

Rodney was anxiously waiting by the door when he heard John knock. He waited a few moments, not to seem as if he was desperate, then opened the door.

“Hey, are you ready to go?” John asked, tossing him a helmet.

Rodney barely caught it in time. “What–?”

John pointed at the bike parked in front of Rodney’s house. “I offered you a ride, didn’t I?”

“Yes, but you didn’t mention that deathtrap. Are you aware of how many people die a year in motorcycle accidents?”

“After you pilot in a warzone, bikes in the city start looking a lot safer”

“Well, some of us don’t have a death wish.”

John made a weird face at the words ‘death wish’. “It’s not about having a death wish, I couldn’t afford a car.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be a billionaire?”

“My father is a billionaire, I could barely afford rent. Why, is that a deal breaker?”

Rodney just blinked at his for a moment. “The bike? I guess I can allow you a couple of stupid decisions.”

John turned serious. “No, I mean the money.”

Rodney rolled his eyes dramatically. “Yes, because I am that shallow. After you have enough to live comfortably, money is just a high score. I mean, technically, last time I checked I was a millionaire. I’ve been working in the private sector for a long time, and I am after all a genius. Still, I don’t seem to be able to spend more than ten percent of what I earn. If I was after money, I would start spending mine first.”

John laughed. “Come on, then. I promise to drive carefully.”

Rodney almost suggested they took his car, but that would mean having to bring John back to his place no matter what was the outcome of their date, while if he went now with John he could always get a cab back home if needed, and in his experience corporate parties rarely ended well. “Fine, but don’t you dare run,” he said not very happily, walking towards the bike.

John followed him with a smile. He sat down, patting the space behind him. “Hold on tight.”

Rodney hesitantly climbed behind him, and placed his arms firmly around John, making him squeak. “Sorry,” he said, releasing his hold slightly.

“That’s okay, as long as you remember I have to breathe.”

Rodney would have hid his head on John’s neck, if it wasn’t for helmets. “But you told me to hold tight” he said childishly. He was more scared than he would like to admit. Rationally, he knew his odds of dying in a motorcycle accident the first time he rode in one weren’t actually that high, but that didn’t mean he was comfortable with it.

John caressed one of Rodney’s hands slightly. “Hey, it’s okay. Trust me, nothing bad will happen.”

Rodney held on a little tighter, because when people said that sort of thing, usually something bad happened, but he still nodded. “Fine, you can go now. Slowly.”

John obeyed, staying well below the velocity limit, which caused them to arrive a little later than planned. Not that he minded very much, at this point he was already regretting even accepting that job. He parked the bike and didn’t bother fixing his hair after taking the helmet off.

“Party is this way,” he said, pointing at the front door of the large building. “Top floor. You are going to love it there, the view is absolutely amazing.”

“We are in the city. The view is more city.”

John rolled his eyes. “Have you ever been this high? Believe me, you can see a lot more than just the city.”

Rodney had to admit, the view was pretty impressive. When they got in the elevator and he got a chance to see the number of floors, he remembered that this was the tallest building in the city. He was almost sure he could see a lake; he didn’t even know there was a lake anywhere near the city.

“Told you,” John whispered against his ear. “This view and the aircraft department are the only good things about this company.”

“So, should we start to mingle?” Rodney asked, unsure of what to do in this particular context. He was neither surrounded by his peers nor asking for money, which were the limits of his corporate party experience.

John shrugged. “I was just told in no uncertain terms that I had to show up, no one said anything about behaving. Wanna go look for the buffet table?”

“Now we are on the same page.”

John wasn’t surprised when no one approached him for the first hour. Half the firm hated him because they thought he only got the job because he was the boss’s son, which was true, and the other half hated him because they thought he didn’t take his job seriously, which was also true. He couldn’t exactly blame them, and he didn’t like any of them, so it all worked for the best.

Rodney, on the other hand, didn’t even notice everyone seemed to be avoiding them, instead concentrating on getting as much food on his plate as possible. John, in turn, was watching Rodney foundly, thinking that the man was oddly charming in a way he couldn’t quite put his finger on. That would explain why, at first, neither of them noticed the man coming their way.

“John! You came, what are you doing hiding here?”

“Well, I didn’t exactly think I had a choice. And I’m not hiding, we are just here getting something to eat,” John replied, perhaps a bit drier than necessary.

“We? Did you bring someone?” he asked, looking around.

This time, Rodney noticed, but mostly because he looked right past him, and Rodney didn’t like being ignored. That was just rude.

“Dr. Rodney McKay,” he said, offering the hand that wasn’t holding his plate.

“Do you mind? I’m talking to my brother.”

John forced a laugh. “No, Dave, what he means is he’s my date. Dave, Rodney, Rodney, Dave.”

Dave made a face. “John, why must you always make things this hard? Father is around here somewhere, what if he sees this?”

Rodney rolled his eyes, and before John could respond, said, “I’m right here, you know.”

“Right, Mr.…”

John was faster than Rodney this time. “Doctor, actually. Weren’t you paying attention?”

“Yes, it’s Dr. McKay for you,” Rodney said, because he didn’t want to let John defend him without doing anything to help. Even if what he said wasn’t exactly helpful.

“Doctor McKay, if you don’t mind, this is a bit of a family issue.”

John deliberately placed an arm around Rodney’s waist. “Anything you want to tell me, you can say in front of Rodney. We don’t hold secrets from one another.”

Dave threw his hands in the air. “You know what? Do whatever you want. I’m tired of seeing you provoke father just to complain about the way he treated you after.”

“Funny, I remember things a little different.”

“You should be more grateful for the opportunities you got. Unlike you, I actually had to work hard to be where I am.”

“Hey, you don’t want me here, I don’t want to be here. But there’s no way I’m going to thank that bastard for his latest attempt to control me,” John said bitterly.

Dave went away without a word, leaving an angry John behind.

“Is he always this pleasant?” Rodney asked as John took his hand from his waist.

John laughed dryly. “You haven’t seen a thing.”

“How do you even stand working with him?”

John shrugged. “I don’t, it’s only Friday and I’m already considering quitting if I can’t get away from management. And sorry about using you like this.”

Rodney kept himself from saying he could use him even more, instead saying, “That’s what I’m here for. And moral support, if you want to, although I’m not very good at it.”

John squeezed his hand briefly. “Thank you for being here, and I apologize in advance for my father’s behavior.”

“It’s your luck that you’ll never have to meet my parents. We have zero contact, they may have died and I wouldn’t even know.”

“That bad?” John asked, although he could tell that Rodney was trying to distract him.

“You don’t even want to know.”

“They couldn’t have been worse than my father.”

“Wanna bet? I’ll let you go first.”

“My father kicked me out of the house two weeks before I went to college because he saw me kiss the son of his CEO at the time. Joke's on him because the guy took his father’s corporate card and we stayed in a hotel for those two weeks. But that was a last drop kind of situation, he had already said before in no uncertain terms that he wouldn’t have a gay son, and kept trying to convince me I could just choose to be straight.”

Rodney made a face. “Wow, fine, this is worse than I was expecting. My parents were a different type of jerks, or at least they never got to prove they were that kind of jerks because they never found out I was bi. Anyway, I was once interrogated under suspicion of terrorism because my mother called the police in on one of my science projects. I was thirteen. And fine, I was looking into how to build a nuclear warhead, but that’s beside the point.”

“That’s pretty impressive.” John took a glass of champagne from a passing waiter, and one glass of the non-alcoholic version that was on the buffet table. “A toast to bad parenting?” he asked, offering the champagne to Rodney.

Rodney accepted it. “I’ll drink to that,” he said before drinking it all at once. “So, did you ask me here so your father can catch you kissing a guy again?”

John frowned. “Is that what you think of me?”

“I don’t mean it in a bad way. But you did ask me out specifically because of this party, sorry if I’m not sure what your intentions are.”

John turned to Rodney, looking at him as if nothing else in the room mattered, and caressed Rodney’s lip intently with his thumb. “When I kiss you, it will be because we both want it. Yes, I did invite you here to provoke my father. But also because a dork fought me over a children’s toy and we had a nice chat. And I have to say, I was really disappointed when you thought whatever is starting to happen here was fake.”

Rodney took a moment to process that information, then swallowed hard. “I called a friend that morning, before going to meet you at the café. I asked him for advice on how to turn this into something real, and that was embarrassing for all parties involved. What I’m saying is, as far as I’m concerned, kissing is definitively on the table.”

“You know what? Why don’t we get out of here? This was a stupid plan anyway. I don’t give a fuck about what my father–”

“John!” They both turned to look at the angry man yelling at them. “What do you think you are doing? I give you a second chance when no one would and this is how you repay me, by humiliating me in front of my colleagues?”

“A second chance? You begged me to come work here! You harassed me for months until I accepted to come here! You made sure I couldn’t get a job anywhere else in this city just to make me desperate enough to accept your offer! I’m the one giving you a second chance, but from what I can see you are still the same bigoted son of a bitch you always were.” John knew it was a mistake the moment the words left his mouth, but working there was also a mistake. He always knew that he couldn’t pretend to stand his father for long, even if he really needed the money.

“You know what? I give up on you. You are fired! I’ll have security escort you out of here and don’t even bother coming for your things.”

Rodney knew it wasn’t his place to interfere, but the absurdity of the situation had reached a critical limit. “Are you fucking serious? It’s 2015! Who the fuck fires someone, let alone their own son for being gay?”

John’s father looked at Rodney as if it was the first time he saw him. “First of all, this is none of your business, and I’m rich enough to do whatever the fuck I want. Secondly, I bet he didn’t even tell you about his lovely wife Nancy, did he?”

“You don’t get to talk to him like that!” John yelled at him, then gently grabbed Rodney’s arm. “Come on, Rodney, we are out of here.”

John was shaking by the time they got to the elevator and Rodney didn’t know what to do to help him. He decided not to ask about Nancy, even though he was terrified at the possibility that John was married. Instead, he said, “He can’t just do this. That’s a lawsuit waiting to happen.”

John laughed bitterly, without meeting his eyes. “He can, and he did it before. Back when I was a teenager, actually. Fired a manager when he found out she was a lesbian, and I think he’s still stalling that lawsuit. I’m sure there are other cases I don’t know about. The law just doesn’t work against people with this much money.”

Rodney grabbed him by the hair, forcing John to look at him. “Well, fuck him. You can do better than working here.” Then Rodney kissed him. He might not be good at comforting words, but he was told he’s a pretty great kisser, so the least he can do is distract him.

John pushed him against the wall, kissing him back eagerly. By the time the doors opened on the first floor, security had real cause to throw them out.

\---

Somewhere along the way to Rodney’s house, they decided to buy some beer and head for a pier. As it turns out, John did know they lived near a considerable lake, and Rodney should get to know better the city he had been living in for the past five years.

“We are going to have to call a cab,” Rodney said as they drank their second beer, and the silence became too much.

John shrugged. “Don’t worry, I don’t drink and drive.”

“So, that thing I said about bombs? I’m really good at making them, I even have a pretty good gasp at biological weapons, and access to very dangerous things in my lab and the ones around it. Just something to keep in mind, in case you want some revenge.”

That got a laugh out of John. “Teenage me might have held you to that offer.”

“Teenage me would have been happy to do it.”

“Listen, what my father said about Nancy,” John paused, hesitating.

“You don’t have to tell me.” Rodney wasn’t sure why he said that. He wanted to know, needed to know that he wasn’t just being used by a married man for shock value, even though John gave him every indication that this was serious, or at the very least could become serious.

“No, it’s ok. Nancy is my ex-wife. My father knows I’ve been divorced for years, so he just said that to get under your skin. Truth be told, I may have married her because he got under mine. He convinced me it was in my best interest to get married. I convinced myself that I could do it. I wanted to fly, DADT was still a threat, and I told myself that maybe I could be bisexual. Silly, now that I think about it. I loved her, in a way, but there was just too much to hide. In the end, we were making each other miserable, so we parted ways.”

Rodney squeezed his hand. “I’m sorry.”

“It was over ten years ago, it’s in the past now. I can’t believe my father tried to use it against me. Except I can, because he’s my father, and he was always like this.”

“Then why would you work for him?”

“I told myself that it was only because I was three months behind on rent, and because he pulled every string he could to keep me from getting a job anywhere else, but maybe I had some hope that he could change. I thought I was ok with us just pretending I wasn’t gay, but then on my first day he starts making all these jokes about a representative from another company that wanted a meeting, calling him things that I won’t repeat, saying he would rather lose money than dealing with someone who talked liked that and styled his hair. Then, I knew it had been a mistake, and that I need a way to escape from him before I yelled at him the way I did tonight.”

John was looking at the water, and Rodney had to admit there were some advantages to being in a pier; it was easier to talk to someone sitting like that, not needing to look at them in the eyes. If John had been looking at him, he wouldn’t be able to say what was on his mind. “How are you going to pay your rent now? Do you need any help?”

John made a face. “Oh no, please don’t do this. I draw the line at asking my date for money, I still have some dignity. Plus, if he pays me for this week, I can probably pay all the late rent, I don’t live in a very expensive place.”

Rodney wanted to point out that he wasn’t exactly offering money, and that he lived in a big place, but decided it was a bit too forward, and it would make him sound exactly like the kind of lonely man that he was. “Well, tell me if you need help with anything else.”

John finished his third beer in a swing. “How about we continue what we were doing in the elevator and forget about my father?”

Rodney didn’t bother finishing his, setting the bottle next to him. “That’s an idea I can get behind.”

\---

 

Saturday, December 5th

 

John woke up with a massive headache, Rodney’s nose buried on his neck, and about a dozen beer bottles all around them. He figured they must have dozed off at some point, after spending much of the night kissing and talking.

“Rodney?” he called, shaking him softly.

Rodney growled. “If you aren’t coffee, I’m not interested.”

John kissed him on the top of the head. “If you want coffee, we are going to have to get up.”

“Where are we?” Rodney asked, looking around confused.

“The pier by the lake.”

Rodney needed some effort to make sense of that. “Did we sleep here?”

“That’s what it looks like. Move over so I can get my phone. I’m not sure I should drive just yet, so let’s call a cab.”

Rodney squinted his eyes, trying to process that. “I followed about half of what you said. I’m useless before my coffee,” he finally said, but he did roll a bit to the side.

“Mind if we share?” John asked while dialing, and when Rodney just shrugged, he asked for a cab with a trunk big enough to carry his bike.

Their ride was silent. Rodney wasn’t in a good mood after sleeping on the floor and not being able to wake up to coffee, while John was beginning to wonder what he would do now that he lost yet another job.

They stopped by Rodney’s house first, and he hesitated a moment after opening the door. “Do you want to come in? I have an Italian espresso machine.”

John licked his lower lip. “I,” he paused, then shook his head, and smiled sadly. “Can’t leave the cab waiting.”

“You could call another one later,” Rodney suggested, trying not to sound desperate.

He wanted to stay, even if just for coffee, but it didn’t feel like the right thing to do. Despite what he told Rodney, he wasn’t even sure if he would be able to pay rent, let alone his other bills. He had a lot to worry about, and if anything else happened between them at this time, he would never be able to shake the feeling that he was using Rodney as a distraction, and he thought he had already done that enough. “As tempting as an Italian espresso is, it’s getting late, and I want to see if I can reach HR today just to know if I’ll get anything for my rescission.”

Rodney fought the impulse to say John could contact them from there. “Good luck with that then. When will I see you again?” Rodney added a ‘when’ to convey a certitude he didn’t feel.

“I’ll call you.”

Rodney left the car with the feeling that whatever was happening between them was over now, or would be if he didn’t do anything about that. He got home and hit his head against the door as he closed it, regretting having invited John in and even more having insisted on it.

\---

 

Sunday, December 6th

 

Rodney resisted the urge to call John for over a full day. It was late afternoon on Sunday when he decided that maybe checking in on him, just to know how his call to HR went, and not making any more embarrassing offers, would be almost acceptable.

“So, will you be getting paid for a week’s work?” Rodney asked, without introduction, which was a good sign he was getting comfortable around John, because he never bothered with introductions with people he was comfortable with.

“Hm, yeah. They offered me a month’s pay in exchange for signing away the right to sue. I took it, I wasn’t going to sue anyway.”

“That’s good.” Rodney realized that the problem with his excuse was that now he didn’t have anything else to say.

“Did you want anything else?”

“No, just wanted to know if everything was alright with you, if you didn’t need any help.”

“I’m fine,” John said. “Thank you for calling.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I have to go now, I’m selecting a few places to go job hunting tomorrow.”

“Oh, alright. We can talk later.”

“Sure.”

John hanged up first, and Rodney tried not to read too much into that. He wanted to fix whatever was broken by the party, even though he didn’t know how. They had only met that week, but Rodney felt drawn to John in a way he never felt before. He wondered if the feeling was mutual.

\---

John hit his phone against his forehead. He liked Rodney, and if they had met at any other time, maybe things could be different. He had done the math, and if he paid his overdue bills and the rent he owed, he would have about three weeks left of money, that if he was careful. He couldn’t let Rodney know that, it was bad enough that he had offered him money. Maybe if he could find a job soon, he would still get a chance with Rodney, but now, he had other things to worry about.

\---

 

Monday, December 7th

 

Rodney wasn’t moping, regardless of what Radek might say. Sure, John hadn’t called him back yet. And fine, maybe he had expressed some insecurity about that. He would even go so far as admitting he was afraid he had misread something about the situation. But that didn’t mean he ‘couldn’t shut up about his new boyfriend’, as Radek kept saying.

But the thing was, John hadn’t called, and when Rodney called him, he didn’t seem all that interested in talking to him, and Rodney had no idea what he had done wrong. True, normally Rodney had at least a handful of opportunities to show his sexual abilities before being seen in his pre-coffee state, but he wouldn’t say he behaved too badly. And he had thought John liked him well enough after they spent the entire night making out like teenagers, but maybe he had just been conveniently there.

Despite his protests, he was useless that day, and after making his seventh basic mathematical error, he decided to get home early. He needed to solve that situation with John, soon. His college days were long over, and he would be dammed if he would allow a man to occupy his mind enough to affect his work again.

\---

John kept thinking about Rodney all day. They knew each other for only a week, but this was the first time he had opened up like that with anyone. Maybe it was because it was a long time since he last got involved with anyone, instead of just having a one-night stand. Maybe it was because Rodney was there when he confronted his father for the first time since he left home. Maybe it was because Rodney was the first person to validate his anger instead of trying to convince him to make peace with his father. Whatever the reason, he cared about Rodney, and wanted nothing more than call him back.

His first day of job hunting gave no results. A master’s in mathematics and a dishonorable discharge were the only significant things in his résumé, and the series of jobs that only lasted a few days did more harm than good.

\---

 

Tuesday, December 8th

 

Rodney had no idea how long he was supposed to wait, but John had said he would call, and after that, Rodney had already called him once, so he was afraid of calling him again. Still, the cinema near his house was hosting a Star Wars weekend in preparation for the new release, and he knew John was going to love that.

“Are you busy this Saturday?” Rodney asked as soon as John picked up.

“You know, some people start conversations by saying hello,” John said, but there was no bite to it.

“What’s the point of that?”

“I don’t know, some people think it’s polite,” he said, holding back his laughter.

Rodney rolled his eyes. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“I’m not sure yet. I’m still job hunting. Why?”

“Star Wars marathon, all six movies, special screening, starts Saturday morning at ten.”

John hesitated for a long time, and Rodney was afraid he did the wrong thing calling. “I can’t, I’m sorry.”

“Oh, right. So maybe you would want to–?”

“Look, I’m really busy right now, so maybe we can talk about this another day, ok?”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to–”

“I have to go now, bye.” John hang up before Rodney had a chance to say anything else.

Rodney dropped the phone on his desk. “I’m such an idiot,” he said to himself. It was just his luck, to find someone he liked and who seemed to like him back, just to somehow have ruined it all, and the worse part was that he didn’t have a clue as to what he did wrong this time.

\---

John had to hang up before he ended up accepting whatever else Rodney might have suggested. How could he say ‘I’m sorry but I don’t have enough money to pay for movie tickets if I want to be able to buy food one month from now’? Rodney wouldn’t understand, or worse, would offer him money, or want to pay for him. He couldn’t accept that. John reminded himself that they barely knew each other, surely being apart for a few days until he found a job was tolerable, it had to be. He just hoped he wouldn’t make Rodney hate him in the process of pushing him away.

\---

 

Wednesday, December 9th

 

John lasted until the following morning before contacting Rodney. He had gone to a clothes shop to drop his résumé, because at this point he was so desperate he was simply going door to door not much caring about what the job was, and saw a ‘I’m with genius’ shirt. He picked up his phone and sent Rodney a pic with the caption ‘seems like something you would wear’ before he remembered he was trying to slow things down until he found a job and that he should probably be avoiding Rodney. When Rodney didn’t respond to his message, John cursed himself for being so dry in their previous conversation, but decided that he still needed a job before trying to fix whatever he had done wrong.

\---

Radek timed Rodney’s rant, because he knew just by looking at Rodney’s face that this would break some sort of record. He yelled at the new interns of over an hour, waving his useless phone around for emphasis, and kept going even when one of them started crying. It was a truly terrifying sight, and it came as no surprise when both of them resigned and ran off without looking back, the only thing that succeeded in ending the reprimand of a lifetime.

Rodney was still furious when he stormed off to his office, and any person with a minimum sense of self-preservation would have left him alone, but since Radek knew his mood would only get worse unless something was done about it, he went after him.

“So, will you tell me why you are really angry?” Radek asked closing the door behind him.

“Those incompetent fools just costed us ten thousand dollars in equipment and fried my phone because they ‘didn’t know’ what they were doing would generate an EMP. What kind of idiot does something like this?”

“They made a mistake, a serious mistake even, but one without great consequence. Not like, say, breaking containment in the biolab and exposing all of us to anthrax.”

Rodney made a face. “Don’t remind me, I still think we should have fired Kavanaugh over that.” Having to take decontamination showers and stay in quarantine was a sure way to ruin his day, especially because on that particular occasion he may or may not have presented with psychosomatic symptoms that made him sure that he was going to die.

“The point is, we forgave more serious mistakes in the past, and you seemed more distressed over your phone than the computer they ruined.”

Rodney sighed. “John sent me a message, and I couldn’t read it, now I won’t know what he said! What am I supposed to do? Should I call him? But what if his message said he never wants to talk to me again? How am I supposed to know?”

Radek dropped in the chair in front of Rodney. “I like you better when you aren’t trying to date someone, you overthink things too much.”

“I do not!” Rodney said offended.

Radek rolled his eyes. “You do, this is Kate all over again. At least this time I assume we don’t have to deal with a botanic warfare if you screw up.”

“You aren’t helping.”

“Call him, tell him what happened, and if he says he never wants to see you again, yell a lot and call him creative names.”

“That’s a great idea,” Rodney said, picking the landline on his desk.

“No, no, no, not here,” Radek said, taking the phone away from him. “If it doesn’t work we don't want to deal with you near people you have the power to fire. Go home, and if things don’t work out, take the day off tomorrow.”

“Wait a second, you are my employee, not the other way around, you don’t have the authority to give me a day off.”

“No, but I’m intelligent enough to lock the door in a way that will take you hours to unlock, so don’t test me. I’m the one that has to deal with everyone you make cry.”

\---

Rodney wasn’t nervous at all. Especially because he wasn’t dating John, so this was nothing like what had happened with Kate. He and John were just two people who sometimes went out and occasionally kissed, which was not like dating at all, even though they had gone on a date, because one date did not constitute dating, so he had no reason to be nervous. And fine, maybe he had gone and bought a new phone before calling, and decided to look for a new computer since he was there already, and then he saw a sale on Wii U and decided he might as well buy one of those since Nintendo made some pretty fun games. That didn’t mean he was shopping because he was nervous, what his sister sometimes accused him of doing.

It was a little after ten when he finally sat down to make that call, first on his bed, but then deciding it was too intimate, he moved to the couch, which made sense in his head even though John wouldn’t be able to tell where he was.

“My phone was fried by an EMP,” Rodney said as soon as John picked up, without even waiting for him to say anything.

John laughed. “Still averse to saying hi, I see.”

Rodney rolled his eyes. “Fine. Hi, John, how are you? It’s me, Rodney. My phone was fried by an EMP because my employees are idiots, so I didn’t get your message. I mean, I got your message, I saw that I had gotten a message sent by you, and then the idiots fried my phone before I could read it. And then they had the audacity of quitting before I could fire them, which is so unfair.”

“I was wondering if you had gotten it,” John said, with a touch of relieve in his voice. “It was no big deal, just something that made me think of you.”

“What?”

“Just a silly thing that I saw when I was job hunting, it’s no big deal.”

“Oh, no, you don’t get to do that. You have to tell me what it was.”

Rodney could actually hear John rubbing the back of his neck, and he most definitively didn’t picture this scene thinking it was cute.

“Just a shirt I saw for sale. It said ‘I’m with genius’ and had an arrow pointing up, seemed like something you would wear.”

Rodney laughed. “You really do know me, I own that exact same shirt.”

John hesitated. “Look, I’m sorry I was so dry with you earlier. I don’t want to give you the wrong impression, it’s not that I don’t like you, I’m just busy, so this isn’t the best time for much of anything.”

Rodney hit mute to hide the little excited noise he didn’t make, because that would be undignified, and when he calmed down, he said, “I understand, and you can always buy me dinner once you get your first paycheck to compensate.”

“It’s a date, then. Now I really have to go, I have to start early tomorrow.”

“Good luck on your job hunting.”

“Thank you. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” Rodney said, and immediately hanged up, because he didn’t want John to think he was incapable of hanging up first.

Rodney fought the urge to call Radek and tell him that John liked him, but it was a close call. Of course, John hadn’t actually said he liked him, but he said he didn’t not liked him and that was basically the same thing, right? Or at least close enough that he could consider them the same thing. He felt like a teenager falling in love for the first time, with all the insecurities that came along with that, or maybe like a rom com protagonist, if it was possible for bi men to be protagonists in this type of movie, or any movie that wasn’t a drama about being queer. The point was, he felt like this was too good to be the kind of thing that happened in his life. When he went to bed that night, he had a smile on his face.

\---

 

Thursday, December 10th

 

“Have you considered that maybe he needs to save money and that’s why he can’t go out?” Radek asked, mostly because he wanted to interrupt Rodney’s ‘he said he liked me, well, not exactly but he said he didn’t not like me, but he won’t go out with me before he gets a job, do you think that means he doesn’t actually like me?’ monologue, that was going on for far too long. He just wanted to grab some coffee at the break room, he didn’t want to be giving Rodney dating advice.

Rodney stopped mid-sentence. “Oh my God, I’m such an idiot, for course he doesn’t have any money, he told me he had overdue bills.”

“My boyfriend’s roommate is in the same situation, he just lost his job, so he’s doing everything to save money.”

Rodney waved a dismissive hand. “So what you are saying is that I need to invite him for something he won’t have to spend anything on? He won’t let me pay for him, even though he should because he paid for dinner last time.”

“That’s not what I’m saying at all.”

Rodney ignored him. “What can I suggest that is free? Would asking him to come over to have sex be too forward?”

Radek choked on his coffee. He knew that Rodney wasn’t good at properly dating, having maybe one or two experiences in the past, as opposed to dozens of casual sexual partners, but this was just absurd. “Yes, Rodney, that is too forward. If you insist on forcing me to help, then I’ll tell you what to do.”

\---

“I need a favor.”

John smiled. He didn’t know exactly when he started thinking Rodney’s particular way of starting a phone call was endearing instead of just weird, but it was one of the oddly charming things about him. “Anything I can do to help?”

“I hope so, my sister is coming over this Saturday, with her stupid husband and their daughter, and they’ll stay here until after Christmas. The problem is, the idiot, not content with being an English professor or something equally useless, is also vegan. She asked me to have something ready for lunch on Saturday, but I don’t know any vegan restaurants that are open on Saturday, or any vegan restaurants for that matter, so I’ll have to cook something. I tried a few recipes but to me everything vegan tastes terrible, so I don’t know if I’m doing them right. I could really use some help. So, do you want to come here tomorrow night and try a few recipes? I promise I’ll also make real food to compensate.”

John hesitated, because it didn’t seem fair that Rodney cooked him dinner when he couldn’t repay the favor, since the last thing he wanted was for Rodney to see his apartment. However, Rodney seemed to have put a lot of thought in this invitation, and John really didn’t want to say no. “I’ll bring dessert.”

He could hear Rodney’s relieved sigh on the other side of the line. “Great. You can come over any time after eight. Do you still have my address?”

“Yes, I do.”

“See you tomorrow, then?”

“See you tomorrow.”

John decided he would stop holding back. For whatever reason, he and Rodney had a connection, and he didn’t want to risk losing that. Perhaps this wasn’t the ideal moment in his life, because he didn’t know what the near future held for him, but it was exactly because of that that he couldn’t keep postponing this. He had enough regrets as it was, he didn’t want to add another one to the list.

\---

 

Friday, December 11th

 

The problem with Rodney’s story was that now he actually had to cook, and worse, cook a variety of vegan meals, which was certainly a waste of his very precious time. He would yell at Radek for his stupid idea, except that made John accept to come to his house, so he would wait to see how dinner went before deciding if Radek was an idiot or not.

He was only able to make one recipe work (Radek should have considered the fact that Rodney couldn’t cook at all, another point against his idea), so he made mini soy, lentil, beans, quinoa, and tofu burgers. They all looked absolutely disgusting and Rodney didn’t want to try them at all. Since he was, after all, a genius, he didn’t even try to cook the ‘real food’ he promised John, instead ordering a parmigiana steak from a restaurant nearby and just changing plates to make it seem like he had made it. Of course John would see right through his plan and realize that Rodney hadn’t called him for his gastronomic critique abilities, but that was hardly an issue.

Rodney knew he couldn’t outdo John, who was ridiculously hot in a way that would make Rodney angry if he wasn’t trying to sleep with him, but he still tried his best to look nice, even going so far as using those uncomfortable jeans that he hated but made his ass look great. He was still unsure as to how he could get them from dinner to sex without being too direct, but well, then John would have to do some of the work. If he didn’t understand that an invitation for dinner at his place extended to an invitation for sex, then it was his fault for being oblivious and Rodney would ignore Radek’s advice and be as direct as he was used to being.

John arrived exactly on time, looking amazing hot with his messy hair, charming smile, and leather jacket. Rodney’s first thought was that he wanted to jump him, his second though was that a man in his forties using leather should look like he was having a midlife crisis and not like a model, and his third thought was that the only thing keeping him from grabbing John by the hair and kissing him was the fact that John was holding a glass container.

“You are hot. I mean, nice, you look nice. Hm, hi.”

John laughed. “You look nice too.” He handed Rodney the container. “I didn’t know what else you liked, or if you had any other allergies, so I brought blue jello.”

“I love blue jello, and no, no other allergies, just citrus.” Rodney took the container, moved that John remembered what he had to eat the last time they had dinner.

They stared at each other.

“So… are you gonna let me in?” John asked playfully when Rodney didn’t move from the door.

Rodney was about to say ‘anything you want’ when he realized John meant in the house and not… other things that Rodney wasn’t going to think about because he had to behave during dinner. “Right, the dining room is to your left, I’ll place this in the fridge and be right there,” Rodney said moving out of the way.

John hanged his jacket by the door and entered. Rodney’s house wasn’t what John expected. It was somewhat large, sure, but nothing else about it screamed money. It was almost… cozy, made above all to be comfortable, not to impress visitors. It was so unlike his father’s house that John was temporarily shocked.

At the dining room, there was a six-people table pressed against the wall, and it was covered in books, huge piles of papers, and a random assortment of small items that led John to believe that it wasn’t used often, or at all, and at the middle of the room there was a smaller table with two places set. John could see the marks on the rug that showed that the table had been dragged across the room and from somewhere down the hall, and after a more careful inspection, he realized that this was a writing desk.

John sat at the chair that faced the kitchen, so that he could look at Rodney, since only a counter divided the dining room and the kitchen. Unfortunately for him, the counter was too high for him to see Rodney bending over to place the jello container at a lower shelf in the fridge. When Rodney came from the kitchen, he was carrying a tray.

“Right, so, this is what I was able to make. It’s vegan, so it’s probably bad, I’m warning you,” Rodney said sitting down.

“I’m sure it’s fine.”

“Wait until you’ve tasted it.”

“What do we have here?” John asked when he couldn’t exactly identify what those shapeless things dipping oil and no bigger than an inch wide were.

“Well, they are supposed to be mini soy, lentil, beans, quinoa, and tofu burgers. All horrible things if you ask me.”

John raised an eyebrow. “Is your sister obsessed with burgers or something?”

Rodney blushed. “It’s the only thing I managed to make, cooking becomes rather limited when you can’t use most ingredients.”

“Oh, come on, don’t sell yourself short, I’m sure a genius such as yourself would have no problem with something so simple as cooking. Isn’t cooking basically chemistry?”

John took one of the mini burgers with his fork; soy, he would guess, even though it had a very strong red coloring. His eyes started watering as soon as the taste hit his mouth, and he gagged twice, but forced himself to swallow quickly.

“Shit, shit, shit,” Rodney said, getting up. “I’ll grab you a cup of water, you wait right here.”

John gladly accepted the water, and only half-listened to Rodney’s explanation of why milk or bread was actually better to clear the tastebuds from spicy things.

“Too much pepper,” John said finally, his voice a bit strained. He had no problem with spicy food, but this was beyond anything he had ever eaten, and not in a good way.

“Right.” Rodney looked everywhere but at John. “This thing doesn’t taste like anything, and I was trying to give it some flavor. I may have exaggerated.”

“You did. About one tenth of what you put in here should have been enough.”

“You don’t have to taste the others, they are probably just as awful.”

“No, it’s ok, I’ promised I would help.” John took a different one, and was pleasantly surprised in finding that it was almost edible. “This one is good, but is this bacon that I’m tasting?”

Rodney shook his read. “Bacon flavoring, not real bacon.”

“Did you check to see if it was made with animal fat? Most of these things are.”

“You can’t be serious. Is that a thing?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“What’s the point of having to use bacon to make something taste like bacon?”

“Using a tiny amount of bacon to make a lot of things taste like bacon?”

The beans only tasted like flour, the quinoa felt like chewing grated glass, and the tofu had so much soy sauce that John had to take two full glasses of water before he stopped coughing.

“In my defense,” Rodney started after John had tasted the last one, “I did warn you that everything tasted terribly.”

John laughed. “Yes you did. Now please don’t take this the wrong way, but I hope you haven’t cooked dinner.”

If it were anyone else, Rodney would have been offended at the implication, but this was John, and John had just eaten some of the worst food Rodney had ever cooked and still tried to be nice and give him some tips, so Rodney decided to be honest. “I bought it, actually. But I went through the trouble of changing plates to make it seem like I cooked it, so you should at least pretend to be impressed with my culinary abilities.”

John smiled. “I promise. Now, what will we be having?”

“Parmigiana steak from Todd’s Bistro. That guy creeps me out, but that’s the best restaurant in town.”

“Never went there, actually, but I’ll trust your judgment is better than your cooking.”

Rodney got up. “Right, so I’ll go get…” He made a vague gesture towards the kitchen.

“I can help you,” John said getting up too.

“No, no, no, I’m making you dinner, you have to respect the rules. There’s a script to be followed.” After all, he was still trying to follow Radek’s advice, and he didn’t want to be this close to John without furniture between them just yet, or else the dinner would be forgotten.

“And where does this script of yours lead?” John asked amused.

“You’ll have to follow it to find out. What will you have to drink? Wine? Beer?”

“Can’t, I’m driving tonight, remember? On what you called a deathtrap no less.”

‘Not if things go my way,’ Rodney thought. “Right. Then I have, uhm, water and, uhm, I think I may have some non-alcoholic beer?”

“So many options, it’s even hard to choose.”

“That’s it, you lost your chance. I’ll bring you whatever I can find.”

“Are you always this nice to people you are making dinner to?”

Rodney was already walking towards the kitchen, and froze, stopping mid-step, because he couldn’t remember of any other time he had had dinner with someone in his house, at least not dinner dinner. He could think of a couple occasions when someone was there for another reason, casual sex proposed by either side was followed by ordering pizza or something, but he never tried to make a romantic dinner, not even with his last girlfriend, and perhaps that said more about him than he was willing to think for now.

“You are a special case, actually,” he said after too long a time, and then kept walking.

If John was puzzled by that reaction, he didn’t let it show. Rodney needed four trips to bring everything, but John didn’t offer to help him again.

“Found non-alcoholic beer,” Rodney said, placing it in front of John, and a regular one in front of him. Wine would be more romantic, but he would feel awkward drinking wine alone.

They started eating in silence, but soon began talking with ease about anything they could think of.

They had been discussing puppet Yoda versus CGI Yoda when suddenly John asked, “Do you mind if I ask you something? How did you plan on going to a Star Wars marathon if you have family coming?”

Rodney blinked once, twice. “Shit. I didn’t think about that. Do you think it would be bad to leave a key to my sister and go?”

John laughed. “Yes, Rodney, that would be bad. It looks like you won’t be going either.”

“Dammit, I was really looking forward to that. It’s not bad enough that I won’t be able to go on the Los Angeles premiere on Monday, and that I have that stupid work thing on Friday, so I’ll have to wait until Saturday to watch Episode VII, now I can’t even go to the marathon. The universe is conspiring against me.”

John placed his hand over Rodney’s. “Now, it’s not all bad. Aren’t you excited to see your sister and your niece?”

Rodney looked at John’s hand as if it was an equation that he couldn’t decipher. “Yeah, you are right,” he said finally. “I only saw Madison once, and only saw Jeannie twice since our fight when she got pregnant.”

“What made you regain contact?”

Rodney winced at the memory. “I had an accident last summer. We had an explosion at the lab, nothing too serious, but I hit my head, and was unconscious for three days. I guess I must have forgotten to remove Jeannie as my emergency contact, because when I woke up she was there. She was so worried about me, and at that moment I realized that I could have died and never seen her again, and all of the sudden our fight didn’t seem so important anymore.”

“Funny how almost dying can change our perspective on things. What was your fight about?”

“Seems silly now, but she was a researcher, an incredibly talented physicist, and I don’t say that about anyone, and she threw all that away to become a mother. I judged her for it, we both said things we regretted. She chose family over her career, I made the opposite choice, and somehow I thought that meant she was criticizing my life choices and resented her for it.”

“Well, I’m glad you two sorted this out, it would be a shame to lose family over this.” Then he realized that his hand on still on Rodney’s, and quickly retracted it.

“This is not going according to plan, this was supposed to be a nice date,” Rodney complained, because he didn’t want to remember how much of an idiot he was for years.

“Come on, as far as dates go, this has to be better than being thrown out of my father’s party.”

“But I’m trying to set a mood here, and… uhm, I mean…”

John raised an eyebrow. “Are you now? And what mood is that?”

“How about some coffee? Do you want some coffee? I would like some coffee. I should get us some coffee,” Rodney said quickly while jumping to his feet and practically running to kitchen, because he didn’t know what to say to that.

John decided to go after him.

“Hey, do you–?”

Rodney was startled and turned too fast, tossing some of the hot espresso over John’s shirt.

“Shit, I’m sorry,” he said, humidifying a cloth to clean John’s shirt, but John opened it to keep most of the hot coffee away from his skin, so without hesitation, Rodney touched the cloth carefully over John’s slightly reddened skin.

John delicately touched Rodney’s wrist to stop his movements, and with his other hand lifted Rodney’s chin so he would look at him.. “It’s fine,” he said to tranquilize him, and he meant it; although his last good shirt was gone, he didn’t get burnt.

Rodney tossed the cloth to the sink, but he didn’t move, nor did he break eye contact. He had John nearly pressed against the sink’s counter, and was close enough to feel his breath.

Later, Rodney wouldn’t be able to tell who initiated the kiss, but next thing he knew he had one hand on John’s hair and another exploring his back, while John pushed him against the kitchen’s table. John grabbed his ass to help him sit over the table, and Rodney pulled John closer with his legs. John was as hard as he was, and started rocking his hips against Rodney’s, while working a hand between them to open Rodney’s shirt.

Rodney somehow worked his hands inside John’s pants, and grabbed his ass to push John harder against him and increase the friction. John in turn was biting down his neck. Rodney was about to suggest they moved things to his room when they heard a gasp coming from the corridor.

They both turned at the same time, and were surprised to see three people standing on the corridor.

Kaleb, who was carrying a sleeping Madison, said without making eye contact, “I’m taking her to the guest bedroom.”

“The rooms are upstairs, the first door to the right and the last one down the hallway.”

“Right, got it.”

“What are you doing here?” Rodney asked Jeannie.

“I told you we were coming.”

“Saturday.”

“No, I said Kaleb worked until Friday, then we would come.”

“Right, then after Friday, which is Saturday.”

“No, after work hours Friday, which is Friday night.”

“I think I should…” John said stepping back, although he wasn’t sure what he should do. He was just glad that the kitchen counter was high enough that Jeannie couldn’t see him from the waist down, even though the shock of the interruption had taken care of most of the problem.

“No, sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt your date.”

“I think you pretty much ruined it,” Rodney complained.

Jeannie rolled her eyes. “How was I supposed to know you had a date, Mer?”

“Mer?” John asked with a raised eyebrow.

“It’s just a silly nickname.”

“His name’s Meredith.”

Rodney shot her a glare. “Why would you tell him that?”

“Your name’s Meredith?”

“Meredith Rodney McKay, yes. Don’t you dare ever bring this up again,” he told John. Then, turning to Jeannie, “How did you even get in here?”

“You gave me your key, remember?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Yes, you did.”

“No, I think I would remember it if I had.”

“When you were in the hospital. You said you wanted me to feed your cat and find her a good home if you died. You might still have been high on morphine at the time, though.”

Rodney frowned, remembering. “Oh, right, I did.”

“You have a cat?” John asked, because it was the only thing he could think to do, even though this conversation was highlighting how little did he knew of Rodney.

“She should be around here somewhere. Curie doesn’t like strangers so she’s probably hiding from you.”

“So, can I assume this is the millionaire guy you were playing escort to in exchange for Madison’s gift?”

John raised an eyebrow. “You told her what?”

“About that, he isn’t actually rich, his jerk father is. And he’s not with Sheppard Global anymore. Oh, and as it turns out it was a real date. Also, his name is John.” Then he added, because the absurdity was the situation was too much, “And can we talk about this when everyone has their clothes back on?”

“Right, I’ll go upstairs and let you two get dressed,” Jeannie said, doing just that without even waiting for an answer.

Rodney and John looked awkwardly at each other.

“Sorry about that, I really did think they would come Saturday.”

John shrugged. “It happens. But didn’t she mention this when she asked you to make food?”

“When she asked me to what?” Rodney asked, at first not remembering the story Radek came up to help him lure John to his house.

“You know, you could have just asked me to dinner. Saving us both from you trying to cook vegan food,” John said with a smirk.

“Now you say that, but I tried to ask you out before and you were shutting me out.” John began to explain, but Rodney raised a hand and said, “No, it’s ok, I get it, things are difficult for you now. And fine, I can’t imagine what’s like to have to look for a job because I’m a genius so people are always begging me to work for them, that is, until they actually get to know me and realize I’m terrible to work with, but my point is, I get that you have a lot going on. And I get that you can’t give me all that much attention which works great for me because usually I’m the one that is considered not to be all that available because I tend to work a lot and give priority to my work. And I don’t care that you don’t have any money to spare because honestly, you could just call me and suggest we have sex and that would be fine by me. In fact, you should count yourself lucky, because this is the first time I had a proper dinner date at my house, and the closest I’ve gotten before this was ordering food before having sex when I knew my now ex-girlfriend was coming over which thinking about it may be part of the reason why she’s an ex. What I’m trying to say is that I’m willing to put some effort into this, and now will you please say something and put this ridiculous rant out of its misery before I embarrass myself to death?”

John closed the distance between them and kissed Rodney passionately. Rodney needed all of his self-control not to touch John’s exposed skin, instead placing one of them in his hair and using the other to support himself against the table.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have tried to push you away,” John said when they parted. “I won’t anymore. I don’t know what we have here, and to be honest I’m not the best at relationships, but I want this. I want you.”

Rodney hid his head on the curve of John’s neck. “Don’t say something like that when I have family over, the walls here are far too thin for the things it makes me want to do with you.”

John ruffled, his breath tingling Rodney’s neck. “I think it’s best if we get dressed before we traumatize your sister and your brother-in-law further.”

Rodney pushed John away slightly. “I ruined your shirt, let me lend you another one.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Oh, but if I do then you have to come here to return it to me.”

John studied Rodney’s expression, and concluding he was joking and that there was no need to reinforce what he said before, he said with a smirk, “What if I want you to take it away from me?”

Rodney didn’t have an opportunity to react, because Jeannie yelled from the top of the stairs, “Will you two stop flirting so we can have dinner?”

Rodney sighed. “I’ll go grab you a shirt, any preference?” He could invite John up to chose by himself, but bringing John to his room was a very bad idea at the moment.

\---

 

Saturday, December 12th

 

Rodney was in a bad mood. Not only his date was ruined last night just as things were starting to get good, but he also had to wake up at an indecent hour because apparently small children were like roosters and couldn’t see the sun without making way too much noise about that. He was regretting having invited Jeannie to spend some time with him, but that might be because his espresso machine was still turning on.

In fact, by his third coffee he no longer hated his family, even though his mood didn’t improve significantly with the caffeine. What did improve his mood was a text from John, reading ‘had a lot of fun yesterday, can’t wait to see you again ;)’. Although normally he wouldn’t tolerate the use of emojis by adults, he was almost sure John was using it ironically, and decided to give him a pass. He was just answering to John when someone entered the kitchen.

“So, you and John, uhm?” Jeannie asked, sitting across from Rodney at the kitchen table.

Rodney didn’t want to think about John, the kitchen table, and his sister at the same time, but there wasn’t much of a way to avoid it now. “Yeah, I think so.”

“And how did that happen? You still haven’t explained the doll story to me.”

So Rodney gave her a simplified version of the events, somewhat downplaying his own insecurities and perhaps describing John’s driving as more reckless than it was.

“You are really serious about him, aren’t you?” she asked with a fond smile.

“What? No! Of course not. I mean, maybe? I don’t know. He’s… he’s truly something, isn’t he?”

“I haven’t seen you like that since college, I’m glad that you finally found someone.”

“Let’s not rush things. We haven’t know each other for that long. I don’t know where he lives, I haven’t even met any of his friends. Oh my god I don’t know him at all!”

“Mer, please, don’t do this to yourself. You have plenty of time to get to know each other.”

Rodney got up. “You are right. I need a plan, I have a lot to learn about John.”

“No, that’s not actually what I’m-Mer? Meredith!” Jeannie tried to call him, but it was too late, he was already running upstairs in search of his computer.

\---

 

Sunday, December 13th

 

John had no social media presence to speak of. He had a LinkedIn account and that was it, which was worse than having no social media account at all, because who actually uses LinkedIn? Rodney couldn’t find any information about him online, not even the pages about his father, his brother, or Sheppard Global had anything about him. After wasting most of Saturday searching, Rodney’s plan to find out more about John by stalking him online was a complete failure.

So Rodney went to plan B: finding out more about John from the man himself.

“No one goes job hunting on Sunday, right?” Rodney asked on the phone, again without even waiting for any sort of identification.

“Have you ever started a conversation with the wrong person by skipping introductions?” John asked back.

“Quite a few times, with varying consequences.”

“No job hunting on Sunday, no. Why?”

“My sister’s family is still here, but I was thinking, I already showed you my house, or well, part of my house, less of my house than I would like to have shown you. Now, I was thinking, I’m assuming your house won’t have children that can’t be exposed to inappropriate things. Not that I’m saying that there will be inappropriate things. Well, I mean, I hope there will. Unless you have children, do you have children? You have been married, but even if you had children, they wouldn’t be with you, would they? Not that it is a dealbreaker, but I don’t like children, so if you have–”

“Rodney, I’m going to cut you there by saying that I don’t have any children. Here or anywhere else,” John said amused.

“Right, no children. That’s good. So, will you show me your place?”

John paused for a long time. “I’m not sure this is such a good idea. I haven’t moved in that long ago, the place is a mess, and it’s kinda cramped.”

Rodney knew a dismissal when he heard one. Most of the time. “Oh, rain check then?”

“Sure.”

“I have to go now, Jeannie is calling me.” She wasn’t, but Rodney didn’t know what else to say. And then he hanged up before John had a chance to say anything else.

He felt like an idiot, which was just a reminder of why he didn’t normally like dating people. Sex was fine, sex was great actually, but with dating came feelings and the possibility that was almost a certitude actually that one of the parties involved had more intense feelings than the other, and either that was the other person and he was accused of being a jerk, or it was him and he would want to bury himself in work to forget about it. Even now he wanted nothing more than to go spend the holidays in his lab, but that would mean having to explain things to Jeannie and he couldn’t stand the thought of that.

\---

 

Monday, December 14th

 

“But what if he has a secret wife? Maybe he and that, what was her name, Stacy or something, aren’t actually divorced.” Rodney asked Radek without taking his eyes from the formula on the whiteboard.

“Didn’t he tell you he’s gay? And paraded around with you in his family’s company’s party? I highly doubt that he has a secret wife.”

“A secret boyfriend then.”

“Wouldn’t he then take the boyfriend to the party? Like he took you?”

“Or secret children, a whole liter of them.”

“I don’t think children come in liters. Units more likely.”

“Now you are just making fun of me. What if he’s homeless?”

“Or maybe he just has a small apartment with not much stuff and is embarrassed. Evan was the same when we started dating, his apartment barely had any furniture and he has a roommate, so he didn’t want to show me.”

“Or maybe he lives in a boarding house for hot supermodels and doesn’t want to deal with the competition. That’s how absurd you sound. A roommate,” Rodney rolled his eyes, “as if people still had roommates nowadays. Maybe he’s been evicted. I could offer him my house, but I don’t want to live with him, not yet anyway. I haven’t shared a house with anyone since college, I’m not sure I even remember how that’s like.”

“I’m sure you are overreacting.”

“Or maybe I’m underreacting, have you thought of that?”

\---

 

Tuesday, December 15th

 

“I think you owe me a corporate Christmas party,” Rodney said as soon as John picked up the phone. Inviting John to their non denominational end of the year party was Radek’s idea, and Rodney wasn’t sure what he would do if John said no.

“Not that I’m arguing with that, but in case you forgot, I don’t work for a corporation anymore.”

“Luckily for you, I do. One that’s going to have a party this Friday, and if I have to miss the Star Wars premiere, I think it’s only fair that you do to.”

John laughed. “Hard to argue with that. Friday at six at the Higginson & Ingram complex, main building, right?”

“Yes. I’ll already be here working, so meet you here?”

“It’s a date. See you Friday then.”

“See you Friday.”

It was only after he hanged up that Rodney realized that even though the location was easy enough to guess, he hadn’t given John the time of the party. He thought that was odd, but not odd enough to call John back to ask him about that.

\---

 

Wednesday, December 16th

 

As soon as John arrived at the Olesia nightclub, he thought that the place was a bit shady, but it was the only callback he received after literally hundreds of applications, so he was willing to give it a shot. In any case, security guard at a nightclub wasn’t such a terrible job, and it paid well enough, even though he had a bad feeling about the place. He about about to sign the contract when the pen rolled from the desk, and when he went to pick it up, he noticed the bruises around the waitress’s ankle. Everything wrong about that place fell into place, and this was something he could turn a blind eye to.

\---

In retrospect, calling the police would have been a better idea. The problem with leaving and calling the police is that he didn’t see enough to give them a warrant, and even if a raid was ordered, this kind of people was particularly good in hiding evidence. So he decided to pick a fight with a human trafficker, which, in the history of bad decisions, rated pretty highly. It was sheer dumb luck that no one else was hurt and that he managed to knock down the three guards and the manager of the nightclub, which worked mostly as a front for his sex exploitation business. However, he did manage to rescue the girls that were being held captive at the expense of a few bruises and a gunshot wound that was little more than a scrape, so he would call that a good day, except for the fact that this was his last job opportunity and now he didn’t know what to do.

But that was a problem for tomorrow. At the moment, he had a more pressing issue to concern himself with. His bike was still in front of the nightclub, and even if it wasn’t, his doctor advised against driving a bike until his wound closed. He needed a ride. John briefly considered calling Rodney, but that would mean showing Rodney where he lived, and he didn’t want Rodney to pity him.

He knew just who to call instead. “Hi, Evan. It’s John. Can you do me a favor?”

\---

 

Thursday, December 17th

 

John knew he was in trouble as soon as he saw the caller id. He talked to his friends often enough, but the timing of their call lead John to believe that Evan had talked to them about his little adventure the previous day.

“John? It’s Teyla and Ronon, you are on speaker,” Teyla said.

“Hi, guys. How are things going there?” John could already predict what they were going to say, but he wasn’t going to make their life easier.

“Could use some help,” said Ronon.

“What Ronon means to say is that we have a job opening here, and you know how we prefer to work with people that have military background. Do you know anyone who would fill our requirements?”

John smiled, he knew them too well. “And wants to work in California? No, I don’t know anyone. I could ask Evan, but he likes it here.”

“He won’t leave his boyfriend,” Ronon commented.

John could tell there was some non-verbal communication between them, then Teyla asked, “How about you, John? I heard you quit your job, and you have the right profile to work with us.”

It was true. When choosing where to reallocate once he was dishonorably discharged, John considered moving to California to work at his friends’ security company. At the time he didn’t want to accept a job offered as a favor, and something draw him to the city he grew up in. Now, he wasn’t so sure he had the luxury of choosing, but he didn’t want to leave just yet.

“For how long is the offer on the table?”

Ronon huffed, and Teyla said, “John, it’s us. You know we’ll always have a place here.”

“Thank you. A couple weeks ago I would have said yes, but now I want to try to work things out here. I’ll get back to you by the end of next week.” He wouldn’t have enough money to stay here longer than that anyway, and that gave him enough time to talk to Rodney.

“Take your time. We just want to help, and we would love to have you close.”

John didn’t know how to respond to that, so he didn’t. “I have to go to a job interview now, so I’ll talk to you later.” It was a lie, but he didn’t know how else to escape this conversation. He didn’t like having people worrying about him and going out of their way to help him.

“Goodbye, John,” Teyla said.

“Take care,” said Ronon.

John hanged up, then sighed. He didn’t want to disappoint his friends, but he hated the idea of working a job just because he was friends with the owners. Also, Evan was his friend as well, and he was counting on John to pay rent. And especially, whatever it was that he had with Rodney, it was his first real relationship since his failed marriage, and he would feel like a jerk if he left now.

It was a tough choice, but if he couldn’t find a job by next week, the choice would be made for him.

\---

 

Friday, December 18th

 

Normally, Rodney hate this kind of party. For starters, he wasn’t too fond of interacting with his colleagues outside of a professional environment unless that involved considerably less clothes. Then, there was the fact there was often a good movie premiere on the same day of the Christmas party, as it was the case with this year and the triumphal return of Star Wars, that he still couldn’t believe he would need to wait until the following day to watch. Add to that the presence of the company’s director, Dr. Weir, who was always complaining about dangerous experiments risking people’s lives, and of his underlings in front of whom he couldn’t get more than lightly buzzed, and it was the recipe for one of the worst evenings of the year.

However, this year he also had family staying over, which was more suffocating than he anticipated, and he had an actual date, so he was looking forward to it for the first time. He even brought a change of clothes, showering and putting some effort into not looking like someone who had been working for several hours without a break before going to the central building of the complex, where the party was always held.

When he arrived, the first thing he did was scan the room looking for John. He didn’t seem to be there yet, but that was ok, it didn’t mean he wasn’t coming, or at least that’s what Rodney firmly told himself. Then he was distracted by Radek calling his name.

“Rodney, are you bringing John today?” Radek asked while offering Rodney an eggnog, which he took.

“I told him to meet me here, maybe he’s lost, this place is almost the size of a city.”

Radek nodded. “Evan is coming too. He wants to meet you, he said he wanted to know who was making me rip out all my hair.”

Rodney frowned. He had a feeling he was supposed to know who was that. “Right, and who is Evan again?”

Radek threw his hands in the air, resulting in some spilt eggnog. “My boyfriend, Evan.”

“Oh, right, the one you won’t stop talking about.”

Radek wanted to point out that he wasn’t the one that couldn’t stop talking about his boyfriend, but he knew better than to imply Rodney had a boyfriend, not wanting him to go into a fit of panic. Instead, he said, “I’ll go look for Evan.”

Rodney found himself alone again. No one else would approach him, of course, not after the reputation he had carefully built around himself. So he kept looking for John, hoping he wouldn’t get late.

And then he saw John, but he wasn’t alone. He walked in with an attractive man, and John seemed at ease next to him. Rodney’s heart sank to his stomach. It was Malcolm all over again, except this time there wasn’t an attractive blonde. His panic level increased when John saw him, waved, and then started walking in his direction. Rodney briefly scanned his surroundings, looking for a place to hide, with no success.

“Hey, Rodney. Sorry I’m late, Evan swore to me he knew how to get to the central building and then we spent half an hour lost in what looked like a house of mirrors. You guys do like glass buildings around here, huh?”

Rodney didn’t know what to say next. John didn’t seem to notice he was panicking, or maybe he didn’t care, but Rodney needed to buy himself time. “E-evan?” The name seemed familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it. Had John talked about him before?

“Oh, right,” John said, and he looked a bit embarrassed. “I haven’t told you about him, have I?”

Rodney shook his head.

John rubbed the back of his neck. “When I said I didn’t thought it was a good idea for you to come to my place, well, I should have told you, but part of the reason is that I don’t live alone. You see, Evan is my–” John was distracted by a voice calling his name and briefly turned his head, and when he turned it back, Rodney had disappeared.

\---

Rodney ran as fast as he could. He didn’t need to hear a confirmation of what he already knew. How could John choose this moment to tell him? Why would he even come to the party if only to tell Rodney that he was the other man? Nothing about the situation made sense, but he was panicking too much to think things through. He left the party, moving to an empty room in a more secluded part of the central building, and hoping the party would be over soon so he could leave without seeing anyone.

\---

After failing in locating Rodney, John went back to where Evan was, and now Radek was there talking to him.

“Hey, Radek. Do you by any chance know a Dr. McKay?” John asked as soon as he got there.

“Wait, your Rodney is horrible boss McKay?” Evan asked surprised.

Until that moment, John had only used his first name when talking about Rodney, while Radek usually complained about his best friend slash boss from hell calling him by the last name, so it wasn’t that much of a surprise they hadn’t connected the dots.

“Are you Rodney’s John?” Radek asked at the same time, nearly horrified.

“I think I’m missing something here,” John said.

“I should have made the connection,” Radek said. “I work with Rodney, he’s the reason why we have more layoffs than any other department, but he’s also my best friend, and he’s been talking about you a lot. Asking for advice, even.”

John fought the urge to childishly ask ‘what did he say about me?’, and instead he asked, “Do you know where he is? I was just about to tell him I have a roommate when he disappeared.”

“Oh, no. Did he see you with Evan?”

John shrugged. “Maybe, when we came in.”

“Why, is that a problem?” Evan asked.

“Rodney thinks you have a secret boyfriend or wife and that’s why you won’t invite him over to your apartment.”

John frowned. “Why would he think that? I told him I got divorced a long time ago.”

“It was before I knew him and Rodney doesn’t like to talk about it, but from what Carson told me--Carson is a friend of ours that knows Rodney since his college days--Rodney thought he was dating his college roommate, until he found out the whole time the guy was dating a pretty blonde he even got engaged to. He has been very touchy about the subject boyfriends since then.”

“Then I have to find him and explain the situation.”

Radek snapped his fingers repeatedly in the air. “I know how to find him. Our id cards have GPS on them, I just need a computer connected to the network.”

\---

Rodney was trying to remember if there was any way to escape the building without passing through the main hall when the door was suddenly opened.

“Rodney, I’m so glad I found you.” John went to him, placing his arms firmly around Rodney, half as a hug, and half to keep him from escaping again. “Evan is my roommate, and he’s Radek’s boyfriend. Radek, who I just learnt is your friend, but I have known him for months.”

Rodney frowned, trying to process that information. He vaguely remembered Radek talking about an Evan. “Are you saying Evan isn’t your boyfriend?”

“Of course not. You are my boyfriend.”

“I’m what?”

John suddenly seemed less certain, and his arms around Rodney loosened. “Unless you don’t want to.”

“Unless I–” Rodney repeated, not understanding. “Of course I want to.”

“Good. Just so we are clear on what we are talking about, you are my boyfriend, right?”

“I’m your boyfriend,” Rodney confirmed. “You are my boyfriend. I have a boyfriend,” he said almost at awe. “Oh, God, I owe Jeannie a bicycle.” Seeing John’s confusion, he completed, “When I was in college, I swore I would never get a boyfriend again. Jeannie didn’t believe me and betted me a new bicycle that I would.”

That made John laugh. “Let me guess, she’s the youngest. I don’t think she’ll still be expecting that bicycle.”

“Oh you don’t know Jeannie, she would never let me off the hook.”

“So, you swore you would never get a boyfriend. Wanna tell me what that was about?”

Rodney averted his eyes. “It’s not a very good story.”

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I would like to know. Radek mentioned something about college roommate and a pretty blonde?”

Rodney winced. “Something like that. I had a roommate in college, Malcolm, and I guess he must have recognized why genius early on, because he asked to be my lab partner. One night, we were working on one of theories and, well, we hooked up. And then that kept happening for nearly two years. At the time, that seemed like a very long time to keep a relationship. Except I was the only one who thought that it was a relationship. Then he stole my research, got a huge grant, and I learnt that he was engaged to this gorgeous blonde for over a year. He even introduced her to his parents! I felt like such a fool, he told me I couldn’t come along to their winter home during break because it was too much of a ‘family thing’ and then I find out that he took her there to propose. I can’t believe I was such an idiot.”

“I’m sorry, you deserved better than that. But it wasn’t your fault, you had every reason to believe you had something serious.”

“It was a long time ago, I thought I was over it. I don’t know why I–”

“Hey.” John lifted Rodney’s chin. “You don’t have to be over it. But I promise I won’t do that to you.” Then John kissed him.

Rodney raised his hand to John’s head, burying his fingers in John’s hair, losing himself in the moment. It was a weight lifted from his shoulders, that he could tell John this, and that John didn’t think that he was a fool or overreacting or damaged because of this.

After they parted, Rodney wanted to push John to a nearby desk and take advantage of the fact that this was an isolated room, but there was one more thing he needed to get out of the way. “So, can we agree not to keep things from each other?”

John didn’t want to say this now, not after he had just reassured Rodney, but he feared not telling him now would do more harm than good. “Then there’s something that I wanted to tell you.”

“Wait, before you do, I should probably tell you that I’ve slept with Radek. Not recently,” Rodney said, when John’s eyes turned wide. “I mean, before he had a boyfriend, obviously. Not that it was anything special, on that note, I’ve slept with something like half my colleagues. Not people I have firing power over, though, so that limited my options since I’ve became head of my lab.”

“Well, it seems that the scientists have all the fun. I don’t have anything near as interesting to tell you, but I have a job offer.”

“That’s great! Where will you be working?”

“That’s the thing. It’s in California. A couple friends have a security business there, and they offered me a position.”

“In California? As in, the other side of the country?” Rodney asked outraged, giving a couple steps back. “How long have you known this?”

“They called yesterday.”

“Will you take it?” Rodney sounded lost.

“I don’t know. I don’t want to, I want to stay here. But I can’t do that without a job, and my chances aren’t so good in this city.”

“Of course you can! I told you I have money!”

John’s face went dark. “And I told you that I don’t need your charity!”

“So you rather just leave?”

“That’s not what I’m saying! I don’t want to leave!” ‘You,’ he left unsaid.

“Then just accept my help!”

“No!”

They were nearly yelling at each other.

Rodney sighed. “Fine, do what you want then. Will you at least have the decency of notifying me when you move?”

John realized things had go too far. “Rodney,” he said softly, “I really want to stay.”

“If you say so,” Rodney said bitterly, and then he nearly stormed out of the room.

John tried to follow, but felt a sharp pain in one of his stitches, so he needed to sat down for a moment. Despite his frustration, he could understand Rodney. John himself wasn’t all that good at relationships, but even he could see that talking about leaving just after addressing Rodney’s past relationship issues wasn’t a good idea. He needed a plan, he wouldn’t let things between them end this way. Even if he did decide to move to California, that didn’t have to mean the end. They could make things work being in opposite coasts. Right, and they would have a white Christmas even though this winter had been uncharacteristically warm.

\---

 

Saturday, December 19th

 

All Rodney wanted to do was watch a movie with his best friend and forget about John. And speaking of his best friend, he had just arrived in front of the cinema when his phone rang.

“Rodney, it’s Radek.”

“Where are you? We have to get in line.”

“About that, I can’t go.”

“What do you mean, you can’t come? It’s Star Wars!”

“Mother needs help shopping for Christmas dinner.”

“Well, don’t think I won’t be going just for sympathy. At most I won’t spoil you, but I already waited far too long.”

“About that, I gave my ticket to John, since it’s too late to return it. Have fun.”

“You did what?” Rodney asked, but the line was already dead.

It was obvious that Radek had done this on purpose. Which meant John told him about their fight. Or that he told Evan and Evan told Radek. Being friends with his boyfriend’s friend’s boyfriend was weird, he didn’t know what to think of it. However, Rodney couldn’t do anything about it. It wasn’t as if he was going to miss Star Wars just because they had a fight.

Rodney had just decided that when he heard John calling his name.

“Radek gave me his–” John started.

“Yes, yes, I know. He called me. I assumed you asked him to do that?”

“What? No. I thought I would wait for a good quality torrent. Movies aren’t really in my budget right now. He said he had to help his… He and Evan must have planned this.”

Rodney sighed. “Yes, that does sound like Radek.” He went over to the line. “There will be no talking during the movie,” Rodney said to John, that followed him.

John took that for what it was, an opening to talk now about what had happened. “I haven’t given up looking for a job here. I told Teyla, that’s my friend, that I would answer by the end of the week.”

“So soon?”

“I’m not sure I can stay for longer.” John was ashamed to admit it, but it was better than trying to hide things and that leading to another fight.

“So what you are saying is that if you find a job, you’ll stay?”

John nodded. “Of course I will, but my chances don’t look so good. No one is hiring this close to the end of the year. If I knew I could get a job in January, I could sell my bike, but I’ll need that if I have to move. You would be surprised to hear how expensive it is to cross the country.”

That gave Rodney an idea, but he didn’t want to say anything yet, in case things didn’t work out. “You could give me your resumé, I could try to pass it around my contacts. Even though most of my contacts don’t work with people that just have master’s degrees. And I think they all hate me. The scientific community is a jealous bunch.”

John raised an eyebrow. “How do you know that I have a master’s degree?”

“Oh, well, I may have googled it. Don’t let it get over your head, I only did it because you don’t have much of an online presence and I was curious.”

John smiled. “You know, somehow that doesn’t surprise me. Oh, and before I forget, Radek asked me to ask you something.”

\---

 

Sunday, December 20th

 

Rodney wanted to kill Radek for getting him into the most awkward situation of his entire life. It started out innocently enough, the Zelenka matriarch, whose name Rodney never bothered to learn how to pronounce, always wanted to meet her favorite son’s best friend and co-worker (boss, Rodney wanted to correct, but the woman didn’t speak a word of English and Radek refused to translate that part for him), and when she heard of the coincidence about their respective boyfriends, she demanded that Radek brought everybody for a nice friendly dinner at her home. Of course then Jeannie wanted to come along too, and bring her husband and daughter.

And that’s how Rodney ended up trapped in a conversation half in Czech, half in English, with Radek’s mother and his truly absurd number of siblings, the man himself, Evan, John, Jeannie, and Kaleb, while Madison ran around playing with what Rodney assumed were Radek’s nieces, because the idea that that old woman could have young children was too horrifying to entertain.

“I can’t believe you forced me to come,” he whispered to John.

“I didn’t force you, I asked. And Radek didn’t tell me it would be a family convention,” John whispered back.

Rodney wanted to complain more, but his phone chose this moment to beep indicating a new message. The message read, ‘Find the budget and get approval from Weir before the plane lands, then we’ll talk. Otherwise, stop calling me or my husband.’ Rodney immediately got up. “I have to go.”

John raised an eyebrow. “Is everything alright?”

“Maybe. I’m not sure, I have to find Weir right now.”

“Weir?” Radek asked. “Is something wrong at the lab?”

“I’ll explain everything Monday if this works,” he said already by the door.

“Wait, Meredith, we came with you!” Jeannie yelled and tried to follow Rodney, but it was too late, he had already left.

\---

 

Monday, December 21st

 

It was the middle of the night when Radek woke up with his phone ringing. He ignored it the first time, and when it started ringing the second time, he cursed loudly in Czech, answering without opening his eyes.

“What’s John’s address?”

At that time of night, Radek couldn’t even think clearly enough to remember if he knew a John, let alone what an address even was, and he didn’t have the faintest idea of who he was talking to. “Huh?”

“John, John Sheppard, what’s the address? Also known as the same place your boyfriend lives?”

Right. Boyfriend, he definitively knew the answer to that. “Here.” There it was, he knew that he knew that.

If Radek wasn’t mostly asleep, he would have been able to tell that Rodney was rolling his eyes just by his tone. “You are useless. Don’t hang up, I’m tracking your phone.”

Radek got the ‘don’t hang up’, so he just tossed the phone back in the nightstand.

“Who was it?” Evan asked in a sleepy voice.

“Rodney, I think.” And then he went back to sleep.

\---

It was four in the morning when someone broke into the apartment, waking up Evan, Radek, and John. Before any of them could react, Rodney had already found John’s room, and was dragging him out of the bed.

“Come on, you have to shower and I have to put you in decent clothes, we don’t have much time.”

“Much time for what?” John managed to ask while sitting on the bed, still trying to figure out why exactly was Rodney there, and how did he even know where John lived.

“To get to the airport! Come on, it’s a very small window of opportunity.” Rodney pulled him out of the bed and pushed him towards the bathroom. “Shower, fast. I’ll pick your clothes.”

“Rodney, what are you doing here?” Radek asked in the hallway.

“Oh, Radek, before I forget, our discretionary budget was expanded to twenty million, and we’ll need that because I donated some of our equipment to the S lab at building G-1,” Rodney said without stopping on his way to finding nice clothes for John to wear.

“What are you talking about? Isn’t that Carter’s lab? Does this have anything to do with your talk with Weir yesterday?”

“O’Neill wouldn’t take my call so I had to bribe Carter to help me by saying she forgives me. Damn Jackson isn’t even in the country, he would have been easier to bribe. Do you even know what they have going on there? I know Carter and O’Neill are married but I’m pretty sure I saw Jackson and–Oh, come on, are those the best clothes he has? We have to make a nice impression!”

“Rodney, slow down,” said Radek.

“We don’t have time! The plane lands at five and if we let O’Neill leave the airport he won’t listen. I didn’t just spend the last day and a half running around trying to create this opening just to waste this now.” He placed the clothes in a stool in front of the bathroom door, the knocked and yelled, “Clothes here!”

“What does O’Neill have to do with anything? You two hate each other, didn’t he punch you once?”

“No, the other guy did, Teal’c. I also don’t know how he fits in all of this, but there’s definitively something going on between the four of them. Coffee! We need coffee.” He went in the direction of the kitchen.

Despite the lack of an answer, Radek finally connected the dots. “You got him a job interview.”

Rodney rolled his eyes, despite being with his back turned to Radek. “Of course I did. Didn’t you pay attention to the last quarterly meeting? We landed a huge contract for new airships, and those need to be tested. John was air force, therefore he’s the perfect test pilot.” He looked at the mug of coffee he had made, drank it all in a since swing, and started preparing a second one for John. He had had like twenty of those already, but you can never drink too much coffee, despite what Carson may have said that time about Rodney having a bad case of tachycardia.

“I’m not sure that’s how it goes,” commented Evan, who Rodney had forgotten was there.

“Look, it’s a chance, and right now it may be the best one he has.”

John chose this moment to appear, fully clothed, but still seeming somewhat sleepy. “Chance of what?”

Rodney pushed a mug of coffee to his hands. “Is your hair always like this?” he asked, trying to pet it down. “Dammit, you are being difficult on purpose. Let’s go, we don’t have time for this.”

“Where? Rodney, can you please explain to me what’s going on?”

“I’ll explain in the car, let’s go.”

\---

“Fine,” John said as soon as he strapped his seatbelt on, “I’m here, now explain.”

“Our complex has several different labs and testing facilities and basically everything you can imagine. One of them designs aircrafts, and they’re working on a huge order, so they need more test pilots, but they didn’t have the budget to hire any. So I went to Weir and basically bothered her until she agreed to an emergency increase in funds. Now, O’Neill’s department gets to hire five new pilots, and I pulled some strings with his wife to get you a job interview, since he normally only hires referrals.”

“Rodney, I appreciate what you’ve done, but I don’t want to get a job as a favor.”

Rodney waved, and nearly hit a parked car. “Don’t worry, you won’t. O’Neill hates me because I hit on his wife at a Christmas party. Before I knew they were married, mind you. I thought he and the head of the Archeology department had something going on. And maybe they do, it’s confusing. And she hates me because I called her a dumb blonde.” To John’s raised eyebrow, he answered, “It’s all in the past, I used to be somewhat difficult as a colleague. Anyway, she agreed to talk to O’Neill on their flight so he’ll interview you when he lands, but I’m warning you, he’ll be against you just because you know me, so you really have to dazzle him. Oh, and he’s a retired General or something, so he doesn’t impress easily. Just be yourself, don’t mention my name, and be the best man for the job.”

“‘Just’ that. Great, piece of cake.” And then, when Rodney almost hit a cat that was crossing the street, “Stop, park here, there’s no way I’m letting you drive us there, you’ll get us both killed.”

Rodney turned to him offended, and made a wide gesture with his hands. “There’s nothing wrong with my–” the car hit a trash can and he had to put his hands back on the wheel. “Fine, you drive this time.”

\---

 

Tuesday, December 22nd

 

Rodney was a nervous wreck. He hadn’t heard from John since he left him at the airport, and now, he had learnt from Radek that he hadn’t come home yet. Rodney was half convinced that O’Neill had had him killed and ditched the body somewhere when John showed at his office’s door, carrying a bag.

“Lunch?” he asked, as if he hadn’t been missing for over a day.

“Where have you been? You disappeared after the airport!”

John rubbed the back of his neck. “Sorry about that. O’Neill said he didn’t believe in interviews, and wanted to test me. By the time he cleared me, it was so late he offered to let me stay in the dormitory here. But I have good news, I’m on my experience period.” John said across from Rodney on the desk, and started unpacking their lunch.

“So, that means you can stay?” Rodney involuntarily smiled.

John leaned on the desk. “You won’t get rid of me this easily.”

“We should celebrate. We can lock the door, and this is a very sturdy desk,” Rodney said suggestively.

John smirked. “I wish, but no, I only have fifteen for lunch. I just wanted to give you the news. I wanted to call earlier but I figured you would be resting.”

“Oh, no. I don’t rest, I never rest. Science never sleeps and neither do brilliant scientists.”

“You haven’t slept yet, have you?”

Rodney shook his head. He was on a roll here, and he wasn’t sure the caffeine was clear of his system.

“Then, after this, you should go home and get some sleep, this can’t be healthy.”

“No, please don’t make me go home, Madison wants to put make-up on me, and I already suffered enough of this when Jeannie was a child.”

“Maybe ask Jeannie to keep her under control? You haven’t slept for two nights on a roll, that’s way past normal limits.”

Rodney looked at him in a funny way. He really wasn’t used to people he was involved with caring about him like this. “Right, I’ll try.”

\---

 

Wednesday, December 23rd

 

“Do you have any plans for Christmas?” Rodney asked during their lunch hour, which he was secretly hoping would become a tradition, because he could never remember to eat while he was working, and John was the best reminder he could hope for.

John took a long time to answer. “Before everything that happened at the Christmas party, Dave had invited me to meet my niece. I still have that present I got for her, so I was thinking I would stop by to give it to her.” He thought about returning it for a refund a couple times when he realized he was basically broke, but the truth was he really wanted to meet her. The little girl had never done anything against him, he couldn’t hate her because of the things her father and her grandfather had done.

“Do you think that’s a good idea? Your brother doesn’t seem exactly like a good person.” Maybe that was a rude remark, but he liked that he could talk like this to John.

John shrugged. “Probably not, we didn’t get along even as teenagers. But I have to try or I’ll regret it. That’s what all of this has been about, trying. I could have left for California as soon as I got to the US, Ronon and Teyla always said I was welcome there, but I wanted to see for myself if all the bridges were truly burnt, you know?”

“I think I understand. My parents are dead, Jeannie told me. She went to their funeral, but I was in Russia at the time, and she didn’t know how to contact me. And it’s not as if I wish I had seen them more or anything like this, but I think I wanted to know if they still hated me now as much as they did then. Or maybe I wanted to rub my success in their face. I don’t know, I guess I’ll never know now.”

John squeezed Rodney’s hand. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be, the world is better off without them. I wish I could offer to go with you to face your brother, but I can’t miss Christmas. Jeannie is already complaining that I’m never home. She thinks I spend more time with you than I do with her.”

“Don’t worry, I understand. And what’s the worst that could happen? I’m pretty sure between the two of us I would be the one to win in a fist fight.”

“Well, if it comes to that, you are welcome to pass by my house later. I’m sure Jeannie would love to have you there.”

“Just Jeannie?”

\---

 

Thursday, December 24th

 

Rodney felt pretty much like the Grinch, but he couldn’t wait for this whole Christmas nonsense to be over. Christmas with a child wasn’t something that he had ever experienced before, as he wouldn’t count the ones in his own childhood, since they basically involved his parents trying not to yell at one another and failing, then one of them leaving before the end of the night. Rodney had dealt with his traumatic Christmases the same way he dealt with everything that involved his parents, by ignoring them and pretending the holiday didn’t exist. Jeannie, on the other hand, decided to always give her daughter the best possible Christmas. Needless to say they didn’t see eye to eye as to how to celebrate their first Christmas together in years.

To make this worse, after several days of unusual heat, that morning it had started snowing. Not very strongly, but enough so that now the streets were covered in snow, much to Madison’s delight. Rodney, of course, was a much more practical person, who knew that snow only caused accidents and deaths. In his opinion, that promised to be a terrible Christmas.

When Rodney heard the doorbell, he ran to answer, hoping it was the pizza he ordered to save him from a tofu facsimile of turkey. Instead, he was faced with John, who had a black eye and was carrying a large toy box.

“So, as it turns out it was a really bad idea. Does Madison want an extra gift?” John asked with a shy smile.

“John, what happened to you?” Rodney asked alarmed, pulling John inside the house.

“Oh, this?” he asked, gesturing towards his black eye. “This is nothing, you should see Dave, I think I broke his nose. I managed to toss him on the snow. But don’t worry, his daughter was inside, she didn’t see anything.”

“Why did you fight? I thought you were going there to try to make peace with him.”

John rubbed the back of his neck, balancing the gift with the other. “He didn’t give me a chance, he punched me after just a couple words. But I don’t want to intrude on your family’s celebration, I just wanted to leave this here.”

“Mer, what’s taking you this long?” Jeannie asked, coming to the corridor. “John? What are you doing standing out here? We’re all in the living room, come join us.” She went back, leaving them alone again.

Rodney shrugged. “Well, my sister has spoken. You have to stay now.”

John smiled. “Then it seems I have no choice. Where can I leave this?”

Rodney pointed at the living room. “You can just leave it under the tree. Here, I’ll show you.”

“Lead the way.”

“Wait.” Rodney stepped closer to John, carefully inspecting his eye. “Just so you know, the offer I made you on the pier still stands.”

John laughed, and gave Rodney a quick peck on the lips. “I appreciate it, but I’m fine. If they don’t want anything with me, then I don’t want anything with them.”

\---

It was just after ten when Madison fell asleep in the middle of a match of Escape from Atlantis, the middle ground they were able to find between Madison’s choice – Candy Land – and Rodney’s – Cosmic Encounter –, even though that meant Madison was playing with her father due to the four players limitation. Kaleb was taking Madison to bed, and Jeannie was tending to the fire when John stood to leave.

“I think I better be going, it’s getting late.”

Rodney stood too. “Are you sure? It’s still snowing, I don’t think you should drive that deathtrap.”

“I told you, my bike is perfectly safe, and that’s one more reason why I should be going. Didn’t you see the weather forecast? It should snow all night. I should go before it gets too bad.”

“Or you could stay. I mean, I have another guest bedroom.” He tried to sound casual, but he must have failed, because Jeannie had to hide her laughter.

“Are you sure? I feel like I’m already imposing on you too much.”

“You saved me from an evening of vegan food and children’s games. Well, mostly. My point is, you should stay.”

John’s eyes went from Rodney to Jeannie and back again. “If you really don’t mind.”

Jeannie, still with her back turned to them, said, “Please, just accept or he’ll spend the weekend moping.”

“Jeannie, I don’t mope!”

John laughed. “Well, then I guess I’m staying.”

“Great,” Jeannie said getting up. “So now that Madison is asleep and you don’t have to drive anymore, I’ll get us something to drink. It’s about time I get to know you and what your intentions are with my brother.”

\---

 

Friday, December 25th

 

Rodney woke up with Madison jumping up and down on his bed, yelling “Uncle Mer! Uncle Mer!”, which sent his poor cat running away. Rodney wished he could be as fast just so he could escape this torture.

“Please stop,” he said from under his pillow.

“Mommy told me to come get you for our Christmas breakfast,” she said, still jumping.

“I’ll give you fifty dollars to tell her I ran away.”

“I can’t lie to mommy.”

“Did I say fifty? I meant five thousand, you can start a college fund.”

“Come on, uncle Mer, we need to have breakfast before opening the presents! Uncle John is already downstairs.”

That caught Rodney’s attention. “John’s not your uncle.”

Madison stopped jumping and sat on the bed. “He said I can call him uncle John so you are wrong. Come on, uncle Mer. Mommy told me to say that if you don’t come she’ll come and drag you.”

Rodney growled. “Fine. You go first, I’ll just get dressed.”

\---

As soon as Rodney entered the kitchen, John gave him a mug of coffee and a kiss to the cheek, then went back to helping Kaleb cook. John seemed to be very much a morning person, which was a disturbing thought, since Rodney firmly believed that no day should start before nine at the earliest. However, seeing John interact so naturally with his family gave Rodney a strangely warm feeling, which he noted down as probably lack of coffee or sleep or both.

“Can uncle John come to the zoo with us?” Madison asked.

“He may have other plans, sweety,” Jeannie said.

“Not really, but I already interfered too much with your holiday.”

“Since when are we going to the zoo?” Rodney asked.

“Mommy told me not to invite you.”

Rodney looked at Jeannie offended. “What?”

Jeannie rolled her eyes. “I just told her that you aren’t much of a zoo fan, and you might have something better to do.”

“Oh, but John’s invited and I’m not?”

“No, Rodney, I just thought that you and John might have other plans. Together. While we’ll be out of the house of a few hours, visiting the zoo,” she said giving him a significative look.

John gagged with his coffee, and Rodney turned bright red when he understood her meaning. “Well, thanks for ruining it. Now it’s too awkward.”

“What are your plans, uncle Mer?”

“Nothing, absolutely nothing. You know what, we’re going to the zoo with you.”

“Even uncle John?”

Rodney shrugged, and John said, “Sure, why not?”

\---

 

Saturday, December 26th

 

Rodney wondered if it was possible to actually die from sexual frustration. Perhaps he shouldn’t have decided to go to the zoo, which was incredibly expensive just because it was open on a holiday, but he wouldn’t have been able to do anything thinking that his sister would know what he was doing. Although of course going meant he spent even more time around John while in the company of a child, so he wouldn’t trust his ability not to jump John the next time he saw him if they were alone.

In fact, he was just wondering if he could convince John to let him pay for a motel, since John had already spent money he didn’t have yet on the zoo, when his phone rang.

“Hey, Rodney. Are you busy now?” John asked.

Rodney rolled his eyes. That’s why those random greetings were a waste of time. “On a Saturday afternoon the day after Christmas? I couldn’t be under more boring circumstances if I tried.”

“That’s good, because, uh, I was thinking…” John hesitated, and Rodney could picture him rubbing the back of his neck. “Evan won’t come home tonight, Radek is taking him on a weekend getaway. So, I was thinking, you know, the apartment is a mess, but have been here the other day and you already know that. So maybe I could pay you back for that dinner? We could order something or–”

“John, are you inviting me for a place where we’ll be alone and undisturbed?” Rodney was never one for subtlety, and before John could reply, he looked at his watch and said, “Is four too early to get there?”

John sighed relieved, which Rodney interpreted as ‘thank god we are speaking the same language’. “I’ll just grab and quick shower and I’ll be waiting you.”

Rodney did the math, if he hurried, he could shower and get to John’s in under forty minutes.

\---

Rodney was glad that they were dropping any pretense, because he wasn’t good at this whole pretending game that was involved in dating, but he couldn’t say he wasn’t a bit nervous. It had just been a couple weeks since their dinner had been interrupted, but in this time they had become closer, and getting to know someone before sleeping with them wasn’t something Rodney was used to doing.

The problem with doing things this way was that somewhere along the way it stopped feeling like having fun with a random hot guy he met at a shop, and more like this was something he didn’t want to lose. It was a new feeling, and one he wasn’t sure he liked. They had done everything out of order, and that meant that if Rodney ruined everything now, he would lose lunches at work and dates that were actually fun, and he would have to explain to his sister why he couldn’t keep a relationship.

At least now he was sure that John liked him too. If his call was anything to go by, he was just as nervous as Rodney, but this was still something that he wanted. Actually, despite their fight over the possibility of John going away, Rodney knew he wasn’t alone in this and that this was serious since his Christmas party, but it was still good to see John as nervous as Rodney was.

Rodney took a deep breath before knocking on the door.

John looked amazing, in a black turtleneck and dark jeans. Rodney was fascinated to see again that even wet John’s hair went in every direction, but now he could really appreciate this since he wasn’t stressing over a job interview. But what Rodney liked even better was the fact that he wasn’t wearing shoes or socks, because he hoped that meant that John wouldn’t force him to go through the theatrics of pretending this was dinner.

“Hey, come in,” John said, smiling shyly, then he moved out of the way.

Rodney stepped inside, and John locked the door behind him. For a moment, they just stared at each other.

“Uh, I’m glad to see you arrived safely, after seeing how you drive,” John joked.

Rodney rolled his eyes. “I’ll have you know I’m a perfectly competent driver, when I have a decent amount of sleep. Unless I’m talking at the same time, because I tend to get distracted.”

“Whatever you say, Rodney.”

More silence.

“Your hair really does defy gravity,” Rodney commented, because he didn’t know what else to say.

John passed his fingers through his hair, feeling self-conscious. “It’s not my fault.”

“No, I like it. I mean, it suits you.” Rodney stepped closer, passing his fingers through John’s hair.

That first contact was like a spell being broken. Rodney wasn’t sure who leaned forward first, but soon they were kissing and John was pressing him against the door. There was an urgency in that kiss, even though they knew they wouldn’t be interrupted this time. There would be a time for calm later, but now, they needed to make up for all the lost time.

\---

 

Sunday, December 27th

 

“Come on, Rodney, I brought you coffee.”

When he heard the magic word, Rodney opened his eyes slightly, still not moving. “It’s far too early even for coffee.”

“Well, if you don’t want it,” John said, pretending to move away.

“No, no, no, I didn’t say that. Give it to me,” Rodney said, making a grabbing movement towards John.

John handed it to him. “This is the only one you’ll get it until you decide to get out of the bed. I made breakfast.”

“You can’t possibly expect me to leave the bed today. I think I may have pulled a muscle the fourth time, which is all your fault for being so ridiculously flexible.”

“When I said I could lift my knees to my shoulders, that was a statement of fact, not a challenge, and you didn’t seem to be complaining when you decided to try for a fifth when I said we should try to get some sleep.”

“I knew you had to have some defects to compensate brains, charm, and good looks, but I wasn’t expecting you to be such a morning person.”

John raised an eyebrow. “It’s past eleven, barely morning anymore.”

Rodney waved a hand, and finished his coffee. “Alright, what do I do to get more coffee?”

“Staying awake is a good start. I left a fresh towel in the bathroom if you want to shower. But your clothes are still all over the house.”

“Can I borrow yours? I really don’t want to go looking for them right now.”

John shrugged. “Sure, I think I have some that will fit. Oh, and I still have your shirt here, from the other night.”

“Do you have an extra toothbrush? Because there’s no way I’ll use yours.”

John raised an eyebrow. “What’s the problem with my toothbrush?”

“I know where your mouth’s been.”

“You weren’t complaining last night. In fact, you seemed quite eager, when you nearly broke my nose.”

“And I’m not complaining now, but I’m not using your toothbrush either. Plus, I said I was sorry about the nose.”

John laughed. “Fair enough. Left drawer under the sink.”

\---

“Your sister called me,” John said as Rodney sat down by the kitchen counter.

“Why would she call you?”

“Apparently you told her you would go out for a bit, and that was twenty hours ago. She was thinking about calling the police.”

“Oh. And what did you tell her?”

“That I was sure you were fine, and that I would try to get in touch with you to ask you to call her.”

Rodney frowned. “Why didn’t you tell her I was here?”

John seemed embarrassed. “Well, you didn’t, so I assumed you wouldn’t want her to know for some reason.”

“I didn’t say ‘hey, I’m going out to have lots of sex, don’t wait up’, that doesn’t mean I have a problem telling her I’m with you. I’ll call her. Do you know where my phone is?”

John looked around towards the living room. “Where was it when you came?”

“Pants, maybe? Or jacket.”

“Pants by the couch, jacket behind the TV. Or you can borrow my phone.”

Rodney looked at the mess around the living room. “Your phone it is.”

\---

 

Monday, December 28th

 

It was only afternoon, but Rodney already hated the one week break they had between the holidays, because that meant he couldn’t run away to work. He loved his sister and his niece, of course, but children were meant to be appreciated in small dosages, especially small children. Also, Jeannie seemed to be even more surprised by the development of his love life than he was, and wanted to do everything in her power to help, which was less helpful and more annoying.

“You know, it was a shame I couldn’t get to know your friends better. Maybe you could invite them over for New Year’s Eve,” Jeannie commented offhandedly.

“Carson is still doing his medical tour at the Amazonian rain forest, and you already met Radek.” Not that that meant he only had two friends, but those were the ones that came to mind when he thought about that.

“You could invite Radek, and Evan, and John. Just a small get together, you know Madison can’t stay up too late, so we can’t make much noise.”

Rodney rolled his eyes. “I swear if it were up to you, you would spend more time with John than I do.”

“I wasn’t the one who left Saturday afternoon to return Sunday night.”

Rodney blushed. “Anyway, it’s too late to invite them.”

“Of course it isn’t, you call them, and I’ll make a list of what we need.”

“I don’t have a chance of convincing you to give up, do I?”

“When have you ever known me to give up?”

\---

 

Tuesday, December 29th

 

“Do we really need this much ice?” John asked, loading the third bag to Rodney’s car.

“Don’t ask me, Jeannie made the list.” If Rodney was forced to go around buying things for a party he didn’t want to have, John was forced to come with him. Sharing the misery and all of that.

“How many people does she even want to invite?”

“Just us, Radek, and Evan. She wants to ‘get to know my friends better’, so she suggested a party,” he said, doing the air quotes and nearly dropping the champagne he was carrying.

“Three couples hardly qualifies as a party.”

“I have other friends!”

John raised his hands in surrender. “I didn’t say anything. I mean, you know everyone I know in this city, and that’s not many people, so I understand you don’t have people from around here to invite.”

“Good, because it’s true. I have other friends, they are just all over the world.” Which was true, for the most part. He had Carson in South America, and he was pretty sure he could consider that guy who moved back to the UK a friend, if only he could remember his name. The point was, Rodney had friends, plural, not many, but certainly not just the people Jeannie and John met.

“What’s next on the list?” John asked, hoping for a change of subject.

\---

 

Wednesday, December 30th

 

“Did we really finish everything?” Rodney asked, sliding down the wall to the floor.

John nodded, sliding next to him. The absence of chairs and the couch was really felt at that moment. “Are you sure your sister knows only six people are coming?”

“I think she’s inviting a couple of her own friends too. Not that I even knew she had friends around here.”

“She could be friends with everyone in town and we still wouldn’t need all of this.”

“We should run away, before she sees we are done and asks us to do anything else.”

“Wanna go watch Star Wars again? My proportional Christmas bonus was credited Monday, and I have to say that if that’s what I get for one week, I can’t wait until next year.” What could he say? He finally had a bit of money and didn’t have to worry about overdue bills, he wanted to have some fun.

\---

 

Thursday, December 31st

 

“There you are,” Rodney said from the attic window.

John was laying on the roof, looking at the stars. “Yeah, sorry. It got a bit crowded in there.”

Rodney rolled his eyes. “You tell me. I don’t even know most of these people. Jeannie went overboard with the whole party idea. And to think she just set all of this up because she thought I should spend more time with you or something like that.”

“Is that so?”

“Jeannie tries to help, but it’s not a good idea to let her come anywhere near my love life.” Rodney cringed thinking of the type of advice she gave him in the past, before their fight. “You shouldn’t be out here, it’s dangerous.”

“Good degree of inclination and a large edge say otherwise. Plus, there’s so much snow down there I doubt I would get hurt even if I did manage to fall. You should join me, the view is nice.”

Rodney looked at the space between them, weighting the chance of them falling, but John was right, the inclination was very low. “First you make me ride a bike, now you are luring me to the roof, if I didn’t know any better I would say you are trying to kill me,” Rodney complained, but he still went. “What are you even doing here anyway? I mean, aside from hiding from the party.”

“I was just thinking about this past month. About how much my life changed because I met you at that store. Do you think we would have met otherwise?”

Rodney took a moment to think about that. “I want to say that we would, through Radek, but at the same time I know that I don’t know any of his other friends, and only just met his family, so that would be unlikely.”

“So all of this is due to a coincidence?”

“If you think like this, all of life is a coincidence. But put the right inorganic components in the right circumstances and organic matter is formed, because life wants to happen. So maybe this is more like molecules bumping each other to form new molecules, the particular moment where they met is a matter of chance, but they were bound to hit each other.” Rodney surprised even himself with that, he never thought of himself as the sappy romantic type.

“A scientist’s view to fate. I like that.”

Rodney was embarrassed, so he decided to change the subject. “Maybe we should come back in, it’s almost midnight.”

“Or maybe we should stay right here. What’s your take on new year’s eve traditions?”

“What do you mean?”

They could hear the countdown through the living room window.

Ten, nine, eight…

“Don’t you know what we should do at midnight?” John asked playfully.

Seven, six, five...

Rodney looked confused for only a moment, then smiled

Four, three…

John got closer, and whispered, “Happy New Year’s.”

Two, one…

They kissed.

**Author's Note:**

> This is actually my word count record, which surprised me because the original story was supposed to be around 500 words before Rodney's internal monologue took care of that before the setting was even established. After this holding a especial place in my writing folder and my heart for so long, I can barely believe I finally managed to complete it. I'm going to miss this universe.
> 
> Things I wished I could have squeezed in somehow, or that were in the outline but I had to cut: Evan and Radek arriving at the apartment while Rodney is in the shower, cue to a breakfast doble date/most awkward morning after ever; Rodney pushing John to a closet to complain that he was being too sexy around Rodney's family during Christmas dinner, ends up temporarily distracted by kisses; making out in Rodney's car in the garage because that's the most privacy they can get; Rodney not actually having any firing power but not knowing it, because Weir secretly decided that Radek is better suited for that (aka Radek is actually the boss and Rodney is somewhere outside the hierarchy); boss!Jack actually having a scene.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [ART for: A December Love Story](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7533577) by [cassandrasfisher](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassandrasfisher/pseuds/cassandrasfisher)




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